“Paris to Add 2,800 Additional Peacekeepers Ahead of 2024 Olympics and Rugby World Cup”

Blue before the Games. Gérald Darmanin announced on Wednesday the assignment of “2,800 additional peacekeepers in the Paris area in 2023” approaching the Paris-2024 Olympic Games, in a letter addressed to the Paris police chief and the elected officials concerned. This very sharp increase in police numbers this year is explained by the organization by France this autumn of the Rugby World Cup and by those in the summer of 2024 of the Olympic and Paralympic Games, which represent a huge challenge in terms of government security.

It is a gear change. Last July, in an interview with ParisianGérald Darmanin had indeed announced the creation of “1,000 new police positions in Paris within five years”. He had specified that «500» would be “in the next two years”i.e. in 2023 and 2024. With the approach of the Olympic Games, the Minister has therefore considerably revised upwards the scheme envisaged less than a year ago.

In a letter read by AFP, the Minister of the Interior explains that “this exceptional effort” East “made possible by the adoption of the orientation and programming law of the Ministry of the Interior (Lopmi)”. Endowed with an additional 15 billion euros in budget, it provides for the creation in five years of 8,500 police and gendarmes posts.

“A visible increase in police presence”

In his letter addressed to the prefect of police Laurent Nuñez, as well as to the elected officials (deputies, senators, mayors) of Paris and the departments concerned (Hauts-de-Seine, Seine-Saint-Denis and Val-de-Marne), the minister details the arrival of the new peacekeepers : “500 from May, 436 in September, 1,200 in November and 656 in December”. He asks again “a visible increase in police presence on public roads” in places “who need it most”. He also specifies that “200 new police officers” will be assigned to the transport police.

Gérald Darmanin insists on the need to assign new recruits to the investigation services “in order to significantly improve the capacity to investigate intra-family violence”burglaries, the fight against narcotics. “The French, he writes, require firmness. Our duty is to listen to them”.

In the preamble, the Minister welcomes the “very encouraging results” against delinquency since January. In the first quarter of 2023, it thus notes a decrease of 28.5% in violent thefts, 27% in violence in public transport, 9% in vehicle thefts, and 6.5% in burglaries. While he has set a goal “zero crime” in the Paris area in anticipation of the Olympic Games, Gérald Darmanin judges that “much remains to be done” and “the mobilization must not weaken”.