Paris Olympic Games media area was cordoned off by French police on Saturday because of an “explosion risk” which forced the evacuation of the citizens including the journalists despite the exact nature of the risk not being disclosed. Finally, it developed that the area was opened later so that access to the media center was resumed to the normal state.
Due to recent instances of arson attacks on some train lines, France has upped its security. This is the transport Minister Patrice Vergriete said to LCI saying that security and surveillance of the railway network was beefed up after the Friday attacks. The employees of the network have increased to more than 1000 and security personnel up to 250, gendarmerie helicopters and 50 drones are additional. However, there will still be some disruptions to train services on Sunday, although service will be back to normal from Saturday. There is still an active investigation under its jurisdiction; however, the persons of interest have not been named yet.
Vergriete said that intelligence services did not inform them about the possibility of the attacks, while €5 million ($5. 4 million) have been earmarked for security upgrades in the Île-de-France area, where Paris is situated before the Games.
Only a few minutes before the organizational start-up of the ceremonies on Friday, train tracks in Pagny-sur-Moselle, Courtalain, and Croisilles were burned, and an arson attack in Vergigny failed.
The same issue occurred in Paris where during the Games, 16 million tourists are anticipated to flock to the city, and subway services are scheduled to be affected. It goes without mentioning that there were some disturbances at the Opera station regarding the 8th line of the metro, although the reason was not disclosed, some policemen were involved. The brand new Line 13 linking Paris to Saint-Denis halted its service from 12:52 pm to 2:30 pm because of a severe passenger incident that trapped six metro cars in the tunnels. The injured passengers in three of the cars had to alight and walk to the nearest station.
