Paris police officers have a new chief. Following Wednesday's cabinet confirmation of his nomination by President Macron, Laurent Nuñez takes over from the controversial Didier Lallement, who is retiring a few weeks short of his 66th birthday, reports RFI.
Laurent Nuñez will have no trouble finding his new office.
He worked as administrative director to the Paris police chief between 2012 and 2015, before himself becoming the top officer in the Bouches-de-Rhone department, centred on the southern port city of Marseille.
He takes over the direction of policing in the French capital, having served as National Coordinator of Anti-Terrorist Intelligence and, before that, as state secretary to the then Interior Minister, Christophe Castaner.
A graduate of the prestigious Ecole Nationale d'Administration (ENA), the finishing school for top French civil servants, Nuñez is 58 years old and has spent most of his career attached to the Interior Ministry. He is a specialist in anti-terrorist security.
Nuñez replaces Didier Lallement whose management of public order, notably at the height of the Yellow Vest protests, was frequently criticised as excessively muscular.
The departure of Lallement is not linked to the fiasco at the Stade de France football ground before the recent final of the Champions League, when there were violent clashes between security officers and fans with valid tickets.