The three men suspected of having placed coffins on Saturday at the foot of the Eiffel Tower were presented this Monday, June 3, to an investigating judge with a view to their indictment. While the investigation has only just begun, eyes are turning abroad: one of the men arrested has a link with a protagonist in a previous case of foreign interference, that of the “red hands” tagged on the Shoah Memorial.
The prosecutor’s office requested the indictment of the three suspects for “premeditated violence”, said the Paris prosecutor’s office. The three men are the driver of the vehicle which transported the coffins, of Bulgarian nationality and aged 38, and two other men, one aged 25, born in Germany, the other, aged 17, born in Ukraine , said the prosecution.
Around 9 a.m. on Saturday, on the Quai Branly, these three people placed “five real-size coffins covered with a French flag, with the words ‘French soldiers of Ukraine'”, a source close to the matter had indicated to the AFP. The coffins “contained plaster”, she added. The driver of the van was then “arrested near” the Eiffel Tower, according to this source.
The use of his phone demonstrated a link with a man, also of Bulgarian nationality and who had been “identified” by investigators in the affair of the “red hands” tags on the Shoah Memorial in mid-May, specified a police source. Two other people were then arrested around 4 p.m. at the Bercy bus station, as they were preparing to “take a bus to Berlin”, according to the source close to the case.
Paid 400 euros
When heard, the driver told the police that he did not know the two young people who unloaded the coffins. He said he met them “the day before with the coffins and asked them to open them to ensure that no body was present”, a police source detailed to AFP.
The two youngest said they “met once in Berlin but came separately to France,” added this source. All three said “they were unemployed and needed money,” the police source said. The driver declared “to have been paid 120 euros for this mission and the young people 400 euros”. The investigations were entrusted to the Paris Territorial Security. The investigation will have to establish “possible foreign interference”, the source close to the matter said on Sunday. According to the newspaper The worldthe main lead points to an operation led by the Russian security services. The placing of the five coffins is “considered an act of psychological violence, not having caused incapacity for work”, specified the Paris prosecutor’s office. This offense is punishable by up to 3 years of imprisonment and a fine of 45,000 euros.
This incident echoes two recent cases where the same suspicions of foreign manipulation exist. On the night of May 13 to 14, red hands were sprayed on the Holocaust memorial in Paris and the police suspect three people having fled abroad.
In October, after the start of the Israel-Hamas war, Stars of David were sprayed on several building facades in the Paris region. The facts, for which a Moldovan couple was arrested, were attributed by the French authorities to the Russian security services (FSB). In both cases, they are “sponsors paid to destabilize and press on the divisions in French society”, estimated the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Stéphane Séjourné, in mid-May.