13,500 police officers, gendarmes and soldiers mobilized to “protect Catholic and Protestant services”

“Law enforcement officers are present throughout the national territory from Good Friday until tomorrow, Easter Monday.” The Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, announced, Sunday March 31, the mobilization of “13,500 police officers, gendarmes and soldiers [de l’opération] Sentinel” around 4,530 places of worship in order to “protect the offices” Sunday morning.

Easter, which commemorates the resurrection of Christ for Christians, is celebrated on Sunday by Catholics and Protestants, and on May 5 by the Orthodox.

This deployment “in France and Overseas” intervenes “in an extremely difficult context where terrorism can strike”, declared the minister in front of the Saint-Maclou cathedral in Pontoise (Val-d’Oise). Recalling that “Christians were widely affected” in recent years by terrorist attacks, he notably referred to the attack on the Notre-Dame basilica in Nice, which left three people dead in October 2020.

Two planned attacks have been foiled in France since the start of the year. One concerned a project to“violent action against a Catholic religious building” by a man “obviously committed to jihadist ideology“, according to the National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office. A suspect was indicted and placed in pre-trial detention on March 8.