France’s interior minister has suggested that far-left activists were behind the attacks on the high-speed rail system on the eve of the Olympics opening ceremony, as a fresh wave of vandalism targeted internet cables.
Four days after the attacks, Gérald Darmanin said the investigation into the arson attacks had “identified a certain number of profiles who could have committed it”.
He suggested those on the extreme left may have been encouraged to target the transport system by unnamed others, describing the attack as “very precise, extremely well targeted”.
He did not provide any evidence for his claim about the identity of the perpetrators.
Darmanin told the TV channel France 2: “This is the traditional mode of action of the far left. We must be careful, the question is whether they were manipulated or is it for their own benefit. There are people who can approach this movement.”
The minister confirmed on Monday the arrest of “around 50 people” who had “clearly, with others – estimated at 150 – wanted to carry out either sabotage or radical protests in Paris during the first events of the Olympic Games”.
There were isolated outages on France’s telecoms network in six regions after telephone operators were targeted by vandals between 1am and 3am on Monday.
The attack appeared to have hit France’s long-distance fibre-optic network, affecting the internet speed for about 11,000 people. Orange, the provider for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, was not affected.
Marina Ferrari, a minister for digital affairs, said: “I condemn in the strongest terms these cowardly and irresponsible acts. Thank you to the teams mobilised this morning to carry out repairs and restore damaged sites to service.”
“It’s vandalism,” said Nicolas Chatin, a spokesperson for SFR, one of France’s four biggest operators whose infrastructure is rented by other telecom groups to transmit their data. “Large sections of cables were cut. You would have to use an axe or a grinder.”
In the early hours of Friday, arsonists had burned through fibre-optic cables at installations along the high-speed TGV lines connecting Paris with the west, north and east.
It led to severe disruption throughout the country and the cancellation of Eurostar services, although the transport secretary, Patrice Vergriete, said all trains on the French high-speed rail network were running normally on Monday.
Vergriete said the cost of the attacks would “very probably” amount to millions of euros and that considerable resources had been put in place to strengthen the surveillance of the 5,000 miles (8,000km) of TGV network.
About 1,000 maintenance agents from the national rail operator SNCF and 250 rail security agents had been mobilised until further notice along with 50 drones and there would be regular helicopter overflights by the gendarmerie, he added.
The investigation into the sabotage is being led by Paris’s chief prosecutor, Laure Beccuau.
There has been no public claim of responsibility but several media outlets received messages in support of the attacks on Saturday. Darmanin said he was aware of these communications and that it was “something that resembles a claim”, but that it could also be opportunism by people seeking publicity.
Le Parisien newspaper reported on Monday that a far-left activist had been arrested on Sunday at an SNCF site in Oissel, Normandy.
The suspect was said to have had keys to SNCF premises, cutting pliers and a set of universal keys in his vehicle, as well as “literature related to the far left”.
