Writing in La Dépêche du Midi, Jean-Pierre Bédéi reports on the announcement by French Premier ministre, Manuel Valls of his action plan to fight terrorism, involving securing extra resources for the police and intelligence services, and scaling back cuts to military personnel. Article source: "Manuel Valls dévoile son arsenal pour lutter contre le terrorisme", Jean-Pierre Bédéi, La Dépêche du Midi, 22/01/2015.
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Manuel Valls has issued a call to arms to fight terrorism. Two weeks after the attacks in Paris, the government has announced the creation of over 2,600 jobs dedicated to fighting terrorism, and pledged to spare 7,500 posts in the planned round of military job cuts.
In a press conference at the Élysée Palace, following a meeting of the Conseil des ministres, Manuel Valls expanded on a detailed list of ‘specific measures’ taken by the French government to tackle the increasing jihadist threat. Valls also mentioned in passing that the official number of people of interest to the security services would be raised significantly — there are ‘about 3,000 of them’, he said, made up of the 1,800 individuals with links to foreign jihadist networks (1,300 for Syria and Iraq alone) plus another thousand or so gravitating towards the ‘French-speaking cyberjihadist sphere’. These include a dozen former French servicemen, some of whom are veterans of the special forces and the Foreign Legion.
Against the backdrop of this ‘change of scale’ and a ‘formidable challenge’, most of Valls’ measures involve budget increases. They reinforce a first wave of measures launched last week at the Assemblée Nationale.
France is still in the cross hairs of the European Commission for allowing public debt to exceed the limit set by the EU. So the government intends to fund these new measures ‘through [equivalent] savings’ that will have to be found elsewhere in the national budget, Manuel Valls said.
In an attempt to prolong the sense of national unity that prevailed after the attacks, the Premier ministre has also left the door open to the Gaullist proposal to reinstate the offence of ‘national unworthiness’*. He has asked two députés, Jean-Jacques Urvoas (PS) and Philippe Bas (UMP) to lead a cross-party consultation.
Valls said that the bill concerning the French intelligence services, prepared by his close ally Jean-Jacques Urvoas, would be presented to the Conseil des ministres ‘as soon as possible’ and brought before parliament by the end of March. Justice minister Christiane Taubira has promised that all of its measures ‘will comply with the rule of law’. Besides the policy of boosting funding for the police, the intelligence services and the judiciary, the decision has also been taken to reduce military job cuts.
Despite a few dissenting voices, there is broad approval of Valls’ action plan among fellow politicians. Éric Ciotti (UMP), who chairs the parliamentary committee responsible for monitoring jihadis and jihadist networks, said: “The UMP can only approve of these measures, even though they don’t live up to the ambitions expressed in the speech given by the Premier ministre last week. They don’t go far enough, and haven’t come soon enough.”
François de Rugy, joint leader of the Green Party (EELV) in the Assemblée nationale, said: “We couldn’t agree more with this pragmatic approach to reducing the risks of terrorist attacks: it goes along with our principles and values, especially regarding what was lacking in terms of human, financial, technical, and even legal resources.” Guillaume Lacroix, leader of the PRG,** said: “We will support the government in providing the rapid, concrete responses needed to deal with the current security threat. Yet we are disappointed by the lack of any significant announcement defending, reinforcing and promoting the principle of secularism.”
EDITOR'S NOTES
* The offense of indignité nationale was literally a Gaullist invention, introduced as a lesser form of treason after the liberation of occupied France in 1944, as a means of dealing with people accused of serving in the Vichy régime and directly collaborating with the Nazis. The UMP have proposed its reintroduction.
** The Director General of the Dépêche group is Jean-Michel Baylet, who was formerly the leader of the radical left-wing party the PRG. It is therefore unsurprising that the final word in this article should be given to a representative of this party.
Translated by Richard Martin and Sébastien Dieuaide.
Editing by Sam Trainor.