For the Ministries of the Interior and Sports, it is an affront that must be washed away. Gérald Darmanin and Amélie Oudéa-Castéra assure it: the Rugby World Cup will not know the scenes of chaos of the final of the Champions League, at the Stade de France on May 28, 2022. “Considerable progress has been made since a year, promises the Minister of Sports. We were able to learn lessons from difficult times and implement a whole series of improvements. »
The opening match, which takes place this Friday at Saint-Denis, will be a new crash test on mondovision. But things have changed since the sad Liverpool-Real last year, which shocked the whole world. In any case, this is what Gérald Darmanin promises. “All tickets are dematerialized and the routes have been reviewed,” he explains. There will also not be the dysfunctions in RER traffic that we experienced. In addition, the controls inside the stadium “will no longer be done directly after the ticket office, but a little further inside the stadium, to allow better fluidity of flows”.
“A maximum level of security”
Above all, the number of police forces “will be multiplied by five” on the public highway compared to normal, and the risks linked to hooliganism are a priori ruled out with rugby, allowing the police and gendarmes to concentrate on delinquency.
The Minister of the Interior promises “a maximum level of security” throughout the competition, with a minimum of 5,100 police and gendarmes mobilized for each match, with peaks of 7,500 for high-stakes matches such as France-Nouvelle- Zeeland this Friday evening, for which 39 mobile units will be deployed around the Stade de France, in public transport and in the fans area of Saint-Denis and Paris. “It is an unprecedented mobilization for a sporting event”, he argues, while specifying that there is “no particular threat” which has been detected on the competition.
No algorithms yet in video surveillance
Less than a year from the Olympic and Paralympic Games, the Rugby World Cup is the first major event for the security forces to manage, with two million spectators expected, including 600,000 foreigners, over nearly two months of competition. The arsenal of measures taken by the executive is in place: “zero crime” plans, installation of 550 additional video surveillance cameras in Île-de-France, anti-drone system, creation of a national strategic command center, leave delayed for law enforcement, new offense of trespassing on a sports field… However, the algorithms integrated into video surveillance, for the detection of incidents, are not part of the tools available, and will ultimately wait for the Games to be experienced.
The municipal police of the cities hosting the teams and the matches are also mobilized, as well as 5,000 private security agents, 20% of whom are female, and 6,800 volunteers, whose mission will be to ensure the progress of the supporters. to stadiums and fan zones. A point which had been central in the Champions League fiasco, and which had become a priority. At the end of the competition, the State wants to transform the trial: “There must be a legacy of security for the site cities”, believes Gérald Darmanin.
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