France Strengthens Security Around All Mosques After Islamophobic Assassination
Nearly 2,000 people participated in a white march in the streets of La Grand-Combe, in memory of the Arab victim killed. Photo: X/ ici
April 27, 2025 Hour: 3:41 pm
French authorities will reinforce security at all mosques in the country following the murder of a man last Friday, which is being investigated as an Islamophobic crime, Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau announced on Sunday.
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In a statement to BFMTV, Retailleau recalled that on Friday he had already asked the prefect (government delegate) of the Gard department (south), where the murder occurred, to reinforce the protection of Muslim places of worship there.
He added that he then sent a communication to the prefects of the entire country “so that all mosques are protected.”
Retailleau was in that department a few hours earlier, where he met with those responsible for the investigation and condemned the attack.
“The hypothesis of an anti-Muslim murder is the priority, but it is not the only one,” said the prosecutor in charge of the case, Abdeldrim Grini, in a joint statement with the minister during that visit.
Grini described the perpetrator as “potentially very dangerous” although he has no police record, and added that “measures have been taken to ensure the safety of all places of worship” in the department.
Retailleau, for his part, said he was “shocked” and convinced that the perpetrator would be captured “as soon as possible” by the police. The search operation includes 70 agents from various bodies, several of them sent expressly from Paris.
The alleged perpetrator, identified as Olivier H., 20, stabbed a young man from Mali who was praying in the mosque about fifty times, and then recorded a video of his dying victim while insulting Allah.
French President Emmanuel Macron lamented the murder of a young man in a mosque in Gard, condemning racism and religious hatred. It has been revealed that the individual wanted for the crime was born in France and is of Bosnian origin, but does not profess the Muslim faith.
Autor: ACJ
Fuente: EFE