France arrests three people after coffins found at Eiffel Tower

French police arrested three people on Monday after five empty coffins wrapped in French flags with the words “French soldiers from Ukraine” written on them were found near the Eiffel Tower on Saturday (1 June).

The public prosecutors have requested that the three individuals, who are from Bulgaria, Germany and Ukraine and who are all under 30 years old, be charged with premeditated violence.

Prosecutors said leaving coffins at the foot of the Eiffel Tower was an act of psychological violence.

France could soon send military trainers to Ukraine despite the concerns of some allies and criticism by Russia, diplomatic sources told Reuters last week.

French daily Le Monde, quoting security documents, reported that the three men had been in contact with a man suspected of having sprayed red hands on the Paris Shoah Memorial, a Holocaust museum, in mid-May.

In November, French prosecutors opened an investigation into whether two Moldovans who admitted to daubing Stars of David on the walls of Parisian properties did so at the behest of someone abroad.

Following news reports about the Moldovans being directed by an individual in Russia, the prosecutor’s office said that someone from abroad had communicated via telephone with the pair in Russian.

Paris Olympics targeted

Russia has stepped up an online disinformation campaign which takes aim at France and the upcoming Paris Olympics, Microsoft said in a blog post published on Sunday.

The campaign, which includes falsified news websites and a feature-length documentary film, is specifically designed to denigrate the reputation of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and create the impression that the summer games will be marred by violence, Microsoft said.

“The most worrisome disinformation advanced by pro-Russian actors has sought to impersonate militant organisations and fabricate threats to the Games amidst the Israel-Hamas conflict,” the company said.

Russia’s embassy in London did not respond to an emailed request from Reuters for comment.

Microsoft said it had found instances in late 2023 of known Russian disinformation actors posting “likely digitally generated” images purporting to show graffiti in Paris which threatened violence against Israelis attending the Olympics, some of which referenced the 1972 killings by Palestinian militants of 11 Israeli Olympians in Munich.

(Edited by Georgi Gotev)

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