The 2025 music festival, scheduled for this Saturday, June 21, everywhere in France is under a double threat according to the government. Significant security measures have been taken.
With more than 30 ° C planned everywhere in France for the day of Saturday June 21, the Music Festival promises to be scorching. But the hot weather will not be the only threats to weigh on the celebrations of early summer. The police will be on the alert this Saturday and adorned to respond to the two major security threats identified, said Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau at the microphone of Cnews and Europe 1 Wednesday. The tenant of Place Beauvau prepared for all the possibilities and even for the worst scenario, that of a terrorist attack in connection with the current geopolitical context.
The concerns of the Minister of the Interior relate to two things, starting with “the threat which can be awakened by the events between Israel and Iran, linked to the endogenous Islamist movement”, that is to say “by young people who radicalize with events on social networks”. “This is a threat that is not overlooked” and which is the subject of close monitoring of the Directorate General of Internal Security (DGSI), “assured the new boss of the right in an interview.
The second threat concerns the Iranian diaspora more and the 62,000 Iranians residing in France. This community, made up of people who have fled the mullahs regime, “does not constitute a threat in itself”, but could be the subject of malicious actions warns Bruno Retailleau. Previous projects of attacks commanded by the Iranian regime have already been thwarted on French soil recalled the Minister of the Interior by referring to “an attack in 2018 thwarted against Iranian opponents”. The fear is that new attacks are carried out during the gatherings of the Fête de la Musique.
Can the music festival escape an attack? History has shown that public events organized during national festivals could be scenes of terrorist attacks like the attacks of July 14, 2016 in Nice, on the Promenade des Anglais. Maximum safety and precautionary measures have been taken by the authorities to prevent an event in this way from being occurring. “We are very vigilant, I did a meeting on Friday evening with all our strengths so that we all put ourselves at the threat, especially for the coming weekend, since we have the music festival and a certain number of concerts, in Paris and everywhere in France”, supported Bruno Retailleau on Cnews and Europe 1. The objective is to “have the best possible security for the French”.
For the 2025 music festival, the Minister of the Interior has not detailed the planned security system, nor the number of members of the police deployed throughout the territory for the day and the evening of Saturday June 21. “We are mobilized”, he was content to add adding that several people are already placed under surveillance, in particular “a few dozen individuals, in reality, who do not even know that their orders come from the Iranian regime”.
Latest updates
10:04 – Increased security in Tuileries in Paris
For the music festival, the Olympic basin returns to the Tuileries garden in Paris. She will take off this evening, before a concert that will close France Music Week. 30,000 people are expected for this free event. Only registered persons will be able to go to the perimeter, with “a security device around the Tuileries and Louvre sector between Place de la Concorde and the Louvre Museum is set up,” a statement from the police headquarters were said.
The Tuileries garden will be closed from 2 p.m. and that of the carousel from 5 p.m. Saturday. A filtering will take place at the access points, Quai François Mitterrand/Guuiches du Louvre in the south, and rue de Rivoli/Rohan counters in the North.
Motorists are called upon to avoid the areas of the Tuileries and Concorde which will be impacted by the safety device. “The circulation of any motor vehicle is prohibited from June 21 5 p.m. to June 22 at 2 am, within a perimeter around the Tuileries sector,” explain the police. For those who take public transport, the Tuileries station will be closed, as well as outings 6 and 7 of the Palais-Royal station.
08:48 – Risk rallies during music festival
Several instructions were given by the Ministry of the Interior before the music festival this Saturday, June 21. First, the police must “take attach” to the “main events” proposed today, “to carry out an assessment of the situation,” said Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau, in a telegram addressed on June 17 to the prefects of France. Bruno Retailleau also asked for “visual control of incoming flows” by the police, with “special attention paid to parking vehicles”. A device against bike vehicles was also to be set up, according to Le Parisien.