French soldiers patrol in a shopping center in Lyon on January 16, 2015 (AFP Photo/Philippe Desmazes) |
Paris (AFP) - The threat of a
jihadist attack in France has reached a level "without precedent" and
new attacks are inevitable, according to top counter-terrorism
officials.
"The threat is permanent," said one high-level official in the defence ministry, speaking on condition of anonymity.
"Not
one day goes by without an alert, the discovery of a network trying to
send people to Syria or Iraq, or an intervention (by the security
services).
"The number of
targets has exploded. There are two or three thousand, maybe four
thousand, people identified or suspected of evil intentions."
Nor are they all amateurs, the source added -- many are highly educated. "They are pros, not drop-outs," he said.
Defence
ministry specialists say the jihadists "use the best encryption and
concealment techniques" and that security services are "playing
catch-up".
"Every time we
get our hands on a network, we see they are each using seven or eight
SIM cards, changing them constantly. And the most cunning don't go near
phones at all -- they use messengers."
The
biggest concerns relate to the estimated 200 individuals who have
returned from training or fighting in areas held by the Islamic State
group in Iraq and Syria.
"They
have lost all inhibitions about violence," said another top
counter-terrorism official, also speaking on condition of anonymity.
Security
services place them under the tightest possible surveillance, but
resources are limited and the authorities are also painfully aware that
militants may wait years before acting.
That was the case with the Kouachi brothers who carried out the attack on Charlie Hebdo satirical magazine in January.
They
had long-standing links to jihadist networks in Paris, and one had
travelled to Yemen for training back in 2011, but they had gradually
fallen off the radar of security services after laying low for several
years.
- Deadly competition -
"Al-Qaeda needs to restore its prestige and will try to compete with IS with complex and major actions," said the official.
He
highlighted the threat from an Al-Qaeda sub-group known as Khorasan,
which is still thought to be planning a major airline attack.
One
of Khorasan's key members is a French explosives expert, David Drugeon,
who is thought to have survived an attempted assassination by a US
drone strike last year.
That
compares with the more conventional military threat posed by IS, the
official said, "which is in the process of training commandos and
sending them onto our territory with high-quality equipment".
Since
the attacks in Paris in January that left 17 dead, France has been on
the highest possible alert with thousands of police and troops deployed
at sensitive sites, such as media headquarters and synagogues.
But counter-terrorism officials say this will do little to prevent an attack.
Unveiling
new surveillance laws on Thursday, Prime Minister Manuel Valls said the
jihadist threat was "constantly evolving," emanating as much from
groups based abroad as from individuals present on French soil.
"The problem is not to know if there will be a new attack," said Valls. "It is to know when and where."
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