The French prime minister has pledged to “find and punish” those responsible after the country’s high-speed national rail network was “paralysed” by sabotage attacks ahead of this evening’s opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics, reports The Telegraph.
Acting prime minister Gabriel Attal said: “The consequences for the rail network are massive and serious”, adding: “Our intelligence services and law enforcement agencies are mobilised to find and punish the perpetrators of these criminal acts.”
Signals along the tracks were set on fire and cables cut and set alight in a series of three “coordinated” attacks that have brought train services around the capital to standstill, sources close to the investigation said.
It remains unclear who is behind the sabotage, but senior figures have suggested the attacks could have been coordinated by Russia, whose athletes have been barred from the opening ceremony, or hard-Left radicals.
Jean de Gliniasty, former French ambassador to Moscow, told LCI: “We are obviously in a situation of conflict with Russia, and Russia is obviously not going to do anything, and that’s an understatement, to help these Olympic Games be a success.”