90,000 police on New Year’s Eve duty in France

A total of 90,000 police and gendarmes will be on duty across France, including 6,000 in Paris, on New Year’s Eve, Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin has confirmed.

Published: 29 December 2023 14:18 CET

90,000 police on New Year’s Eve duty in France

Police officers on the Champs Elysees. (Photo by Stefano RELLANDINI / AFP)

Darminin said that the elevated terror threat, “due to what is happening in Israel and Palestine”, necessitated the large nationwide mobilisation for the celebrations.

It’s also a night on which burning cars has become something of a criminal tradition in France – though, the good news is that this appears to be less of an issue these days.

On top of the 90,000 law enforcement officers, “5,000 soldiers from Operation Sentinel” and “tens of thousands of firefighters” will be on duty overnight on New Year’s Eve, Darminin said.

“The presence of dissuasive law enforcement and the work of our intelligence services are extremely reassuring and effective for our fellow citizens who must continue to live and party if they wish,” he said.

Several départements have already taken special measures to supervise New Year’s Eve. Among them a ban on alcohol consumption on public streets, and restrictions on the sale of fuel or fireworks.

However large events such as concerts and fireworks displays are going ahead as usual in most places, including the traditional gathering on the Champs-Elysées in Paris.

Darminin recognised the efforts of police to ensure a generally peaceful Christmas across France, adding that, “we have December 31st before us”, as he promised an “extremely strong mobilisation of the police and gendarmerie services.”

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Police intervened as dozens of students gathered on a central Paris campus of the prestigious Sciences Po university on Wednesday evening, management said.

“After discussions with management, most of them agreed to leave the premises,” university officials said in a statement to AFP, saying the protest was adding to “tensions” at the university.

But “a small group of students” refused to leave and “it was decided that the police would evacuate the site,” the statement added.

Sciences Po said it regretted that “numerous attempts” to have the students leave the premises peacefully had led nowhere.

According to the police préfecture, students had set up around 10 tents.

When members of law enforcement arrived, “50 students left on their own, 70 were evacuated calmly from 0.20am” and the police “left at 1.30am, with no incidents to report,” the police said.

The protesters demanded that Sciences Po “cut its ties with universities and companies that are complicit in the genocide in Gaza” and “end the repression of pro-Palestinian voices on campus,” according to witnesses.

The protest was organised by the Palestine Committee of Sciences Po.

In a statement on Thursday, the group said its activists had been “carried out of the school by more than fifty members of the security forces,” adding that “around a hundred” police officers were “also waiting for them outside”.

Sciences Po management “stubbornly refuses to engage in genuine dialogue,” the group said.

The organisers have called for “a clear condemnation of Israel’s actions by Sciences Po” and a commemorative event “in memory of the innocent people killed by Israel,” among other demands.

Separately, the Student Union of Sciences Po Paris said the decision by university officials to call in the police was “both shocking and deeply worrying” and reflected “an unprecedented authoritarian turn”.

Many top US universities have been rocked by protests in recent weeks, with some students furious over the Israel-Hamas war and ensuing humanitarian crisis in the besieged Palestinian territory of Gaza.

France is home to the world’s largest Jewish population after Israel and the United States, as well as Europe’s biggest Muslim community.

The war in Gaza began with an unprecedented attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas on Israel on October 7th that resulted in the deaths of around 1,170 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

In retaliation, Israel launched a military offensive that has killed at least 34,305 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.