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France honors anti-terror police in Bastille day

Xinhua, July 14, 2015 Adjust font size:

Honorable guests, government officials, and veteran politicians joined French President Francois Hollande on Tuesday to celebrate the country's national day (known outside France as Bastille Day) with the usual pomp: a military parade and a flight show.

But this year's ceremony also included a salute to anti-terrorism police units' efforts to face high terror threats.

Twenty-one police officers out of 7,000 deployed across the country for Sentinelle, an anti-terror operation, also marched in the parade down the Champs Elysees Avenue here, highlighting Hollande's confirmation to clamp down on terrorism and ensure the country's security amidst alarming terror threats.

"The terrorist threat has never been so pregnant, so weighty, so heavy inside and outside France. Somehow, this parade embodies it. Our troops involved in Mali to hunt terrorists, our soldiers who are present within the coalition to fight against Daesh in Iraq and of course the soldiers in the Sentinelle operation," Prime Minister Manuel Valls told the news channel BFMTV.

"It is a time of gathering but also a time for everyone to be well aware that the terrorist threat is present," he added before the parade.

Calm in France was broken in January when three gunmen killed 17 people in separate attacks. Six months later, a 35-year-old man was accused of "an attack of terrorist nature" involving the beheading of his boss.

In the wake of these events, in the framework of "exceptional" security measures, thousands of servicemen were deployed to France's cities to protect sensitive locations, including major shopping areas, public places and religious centers.

The Bastille display also included tanks and giant trucks mounted with land-to-air defense systems and flyovers by fighter jets. It finished with precision parachutists landing in front of the presidential stand.

Wet summer weather did not dampen the enthusiasm of Parisians and visitors who turned out in large numbers to witness the annual celebration which involved 3,501 soldiers, 208 armored vehicles, 55 jet fighters, 31 helicopters, and 237 horses.

Bastille Day is a celebration of July 14, 1789 when French citizens stormed the Bastille prison in Paris, which helped spark the French Revolution. Endit