France will be on a state of high alert until well into the new year after the country’s senate voted to extend a state of emergency for three months following last week’s deadly attacks.
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The state of emergency expands police power for searches and arrests, and allows authorities to restrict movement of individuals and vehicles with the country’s borders.
During the debate, Prime Minister Manuel Valls [official website] warned [RFI report] that France must be prepared to defend against chemical and biological warfare.
In addition, 164 people have been placed under house arrest with new powers permitted under France’s state of emergency.
“The way they are killing is constantly evolving”, Valls said.
“We do need to make sure that any fight for security and protection of citizens is linked to a protection of their rights”, van Gulik adds. In a recent poll from the French newspaper Le Figaro and radio network RTL, 84 percent of respondents said they were willing to accept curtailed civil liberties in exchange for greater security.
A series of raids in Belgium and a search of a home on the outskirts of Paris on Thursday were the latest signs of investigators’ efforts to piece together – and take down – the network of terrorists behind the attacks before they can strike again. The legislation, which has been likened to a “French Patriot Act”, allows the government to monitor communications of suspected terrorists without prior authorization from a judge.
“They’re acting on the same knee-jerk impulses”.
At the coaxing of President Francois Hollande and restaurateurs, Parisians have rallied behind the hastag #TousAuBistrot, basically “everyone to the bistro” or “back to the bar”.
Under the amendment adopted by the French National Assembly, the Ministry of the Interior was granted the power to interrupt any Internet public communication service that enables acts of terrorism.
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Meanwhile, French authorities said a third body had been discovered in the wreckage of the flat where Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the extremist believed to be behind the Paris attacks, died in a shoot-out with police on Wednesday. But the spokeswoman said there was a breakdown in intelligence sharing with Belgium, where the jihadists plotted their massacre. “I say it with all the precautions needed”. The bill proposed yesterday extends the state of emergency for a further three months and includes a number of additional measures.
