Cazeneuve said Thursday that only local police, who are more lightly armed, were guarding the entrance to the Promenade des Anglais when Bouhlel drove his truck down it. Cazeneuve then launched an internal police investigation into the handling of the Nice attack.
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The Paris prosecutor’s office said Saturday that five people are in custody following the attack.
Officials said on Saturday that people questioned by police had indicated that he had undergone a rapid transformation from someone with no apparent interest in religion.
While Islamic State has claimed responsibility for the Nice attack, no firm evidence has yet emerged that the 31-year-old attacker, a delivery van driver with a record of home violence and petty crimes, had direct contact with the group.
His warning came after President Francois Hollande said he was willing to extend France’s state of emergency for another six months following the Bastille Day massacre in Nice in which 84 people were killed.
French Prime Minister Manuel Valls warned Tuesday that the country must be prepared for more deadly attacks and will have to “learn to live with the threat”.
In a statement, Cazeneuve accused the paper of conspiracy theories and maintains that several “heroic” national police – who shot dead the attacker – were stationed further down the promenade.
The site is also becoming a platform for anger at the attacker.
France’s Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said that after investigators spoke to scores of the attacker’s relatives and acquaintances, the conclusion drawn has been that he was someone who “seemed to have been radicalised very quickly”. More than 200 people were injured.
That brings the total number of people arrested in connection with the driver to seven.
Meanwhile, new information from French authorities suggests Bouhlel might have had accomplices.
“What happened mustn’t tear society apart”, said Abdelkader Sadouni, a Muslim imam from Nice, his voice faltering as he called for unity in the face of an attack that indiscriminately hit men, women and children, Christian and Muslims, residents and foreign tourists enjoying France’s national day fireworks together.
The detained suspects are four men – identified as Franco-Tunisians Ramzi A. and Mohamed Oualid G., a Tunisian named Chokri C., and an Albanian named Artan – and a woman of dual French-Albanian nationality identified as Enkeldja, Molins said. French citizens are now gearing up for a civil war as a result of the aftermath of the terrorist attacks in Nice.
Community members gather in Sproul Plaza on the UC Berkeley campus to take part in a vigil for student Nicolas Leslie on Monday, July 18, 2016 in Berkeley, Calif. Leslie was killed in last week’s truck attack in Nice, France.
“The person who carried out the operation in Nice, France, to run down people was one of the soldiers of Islamic State”, the news agency Amaq, which supports the militant Islamist group, said via its Telegram account.
French officials couldn’t confirm Monday that Bouhlel had been approached by an Algerian recruiter, saying that the investigation is ongoing. Bouhlel’s estranged wife was arrested at her apartment Friday and released Sunday morning without charge, her attorney, Jean-Yves Garino, told CNN.
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But the Socialists have also said they will draw the line at some of the opposition’s more controversial demands.
