The Place de la Concorde, the place the Bastille Day procession historically ends, has been closed in latest weeks for the development of momentary Olympic stadiums. Consequently, the parade needed to be moved to the Avenue Foch, one of many shorter and fewer well-known roads that encompass the Arc de Triomphe.
Whereas the festivities often draw tens of 1000’s of individuals and may be simply accessed, authorities restricted the variety of spectators this 12 months to six,200, who — amid house constraints and safety issues — had been required to enroll prematurely. Preparations for the Olympics have strained police sources in France, which additionally restricted the variety of legislation enforcement officers marching in Sunday’s parade.
Organizers maintained the standard air present. Jets sprayed blue, white and crimson smoke — the colours of the French flag — into the clouded sky above Paris.
The show of tanks and planes is often the centerpiece of the annual parade, which on Sunday additionally marked the eightieth anniversary of the nation’s liberation from the Nazis. However the star of this 12 months’s festivities was the Olympic flame. Using a horse, Col. Thibaut Vallette, an equestrian gold medalist on the 2016 Olympic Video games, carried the torch down the avenue.
After the parade ended, the flame continued its journey by means of central Paris, the place tickets weren’t essential to look at the festivities. Marie Niro, 27, noticed it cross close to the Nationwide Meeting, the decrease home of Parliament. “It’s a second that we share, a second that unites us,” she mentioned.
Armored automobiles on show for Bastille Day had been positioned only a few toes from the momentary Olympic venue that has been constructed on the Place des Invalides; at a close-by recruiting occasion for the navy, younger Parisians mingled with vacationers.
Mixing France’s navy parade with the arrival of the Olympic flame was “atypical,” Niro acknowledged.
“However we protect our traditions,” she mentioned.
The Olympic torch will journey across the capital area and surrounding areas over the approaching days earlier than making its manner again to the town heart on July 26, the day of the Opening Ceremonies on the Seine.
Sunday is the anniversary of the storming of the Bastille fortress in Paris on July 14, 1789, which marked the start of the French Revolution that toppled the monarchy. The event is well known with occasions throughout France annually, and the Paris navy parade and fireworks on the Eiffel Tower are considered because the highlights of the day.
Sunday’s ceremonies had been attended by President Emmanuel Macron, who was accompanied by members of his cupboard, together with Prime Minister Gabriel Attal.
Solely per week in the past, it appeared potential that Macron could be compelled to share energy with a far-right prime minister. However legislative elections in France final Sunday resulted as a substitute in political gridlock, with no get together or alliance having gained an outright majority within the Nationwide Meeting.
Attal, who supplied to step down Monday within the wake of the election, was requested by Macron to remain on for “the steadiness of the nation.”
Macron now faces the prospect of a closely diminished mandate, however has sought to painting himself as going about enterprise as ordinary. Final week, he attended the NATO summit in Washington.
Safety stays a paramount concern for the organizers of this 12 months’s Olympic Video games. The Israel-Gaza warfare has prompted bomb scares, an increase in antisemitic incidents and a renewed worry of radicalization right here. Tensions with Russia over its warfare in Ukraine — and the associated bans on the Russian and Belarusian athlete delegations — have elevated the chance of cyberattacks, French officers mentioned.
Inside Minister Gérald Darmanin mentioned Saturday that 3,570 individuals have been excluded from attending the Olympics, together with “dozens of radical people near Islamist, ultra-left and ultra-right circles.”
French authorities mentioned earlier this 12 months that they had been aiming to have screened over 1 million individuals by the point the Video games start, together with coaches, athletes, volunteers and members in occasions resembling Sunday’s navy parade. To date, 770,000 individuals have been screened, Darmanin mentioned Saturday.
Annabelle Timsit contributed to this report.
