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PARIS TERROR ATTACKS

TERRORISM

Swiss step up security after Paris attacks

Police and border guards in Switzerland are reinforcing security measures across the country in the wake of the terrorist attacks in Paris on Friday night that left at least 129 people dead and more than 300 injured.

Published: 14 November 2015 17:48 CET
Swiss step up security after Paris attacks
A woman lays a candle at a gathering in Geneva for the victims of the Paris attacks. Photo: Lea Devigne

Representatives from the federal police (Fedpol), cantonal police and border guards met in Bern to discuss security measures in Switzerland early on Saturday, reported newspaper Le Temps.

Border controls are to be reinforced in collaboration with France, said the paper, while police presence at rail stations and airports in the country has been stepped up.

Police in French-speaking Switzerland also reactivated Vigipol, a coordinated security plan that was first implemented after the January attacks on the office of Charlie Hebdo in Paris, Geneva MP Pierre Maudet told Le Temps.

“We are deploying more men, more visibly,” he said.

President of the federal government Simonetta Sommaruga condemned the attacks, saying: “I am deeply touched, very sad but also angry.”  

Speaking to broadcaster SFR at a press conference in Bern she said she was “profoundly shocked”.

“These attacks go against all the deepest-held values of our society and our humanity.”

“We will work together with the French authorities and we are also analyzing the current security situation in our own country.”

Swiss foreign minister Didier Burkhalter sent a message of sympathy to his French counterpart, according to an official statement, saying that “Switzerland feels ever closer to France during this testing time of suffering”.

All Swiss security services are in a “state of increased vigilance”, said the statement.

According to information provided by the Swiss ambassador in Paris, at present it is believed that no Swiss citizens were among the victims in the French capital.

Speaking to Le Temps, Geneva-based musician Eric Linder, co-director of the Swiss city’s Antigel festival, said he was passing by the emergency exit of the Bataclan concert hall at the time of the attack and witnessed “scenes of war”.

“I saw people running, screaming, injured people, and the gunfire continued. I understood later that these were the people who were escaping the Bataclan,” he told Le Temps.

Around 100 people gathered in front of the French consulate in Geneva on Saturday afternoon in solidarity with the people of Paris, while flowers were placed there throughout the day.

A similar gathering took place in Lausanne in the early evening.

For further coverage of the Paris attacks see The Local France

 

CRIME

Hoax bomb threats against French airports ‘traced to Swiss email’

Repeated bomb threats against dozens of French airports which led to evacuations and flight cancellations have been 'traced to an email address in Switzerland', according to French authorities.

Published: 23 October 2023 09:13 CEST
Hoax bomb threats against French airports 'traced to Swiss email'

More than 70 bomb threats have been made against French airports in the past week, leading to evacuations at dozens of airports and at least 130 flights cancelled.

Most of the alerts were triggered by emails warning of a bomb in the airport – more than 70 such emails have been received by airports around the country such as Toulouse, Bordeaux, Paris Beauvais, Marseille and dozens of smaller airports – including Basel-Mulhouse on the Franco-Swiss border. 

On Sunday French Transport Minister Clément Beaune said that “almost all of the threats have been traced to the same email address, situated in Switzerland”.

He added: “Since Wednesday, it is almost always the same email address that is used, located outside the European Union, in Switzerland”.

He called on hosting sites to help the French authorities, saying: “Everyone has a responsibility, including the platforms and social networks, not to support this kind of attack and to cooperate as quickly as possible with the French civil aviation authorities and our justice system.”

In France, the maximum penalty for making a hoax bomb threat is two years in jail and a €30,000 fine.

As well as airport evacuations and flight disruption, French tourist sites have also been hit with bomb hoaxes – the Palace of Versailles has been evacuated seven times in the past week.

It comes in the context of a tense situation in France as the country raised its terror alert to maximum after an apparent Islamist attack on Friday, October 13th in which a teacher was killed and two others wounded.

Security at large events such as the Rugby World Cup matches has been stepped up. 

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