Levallois-Perret (AFP)

More than 8,000 people (8,132) are to date registered in the file of alerts for the prevention of terrorist radicalization (FSPRT), announced Monday the Minister of the Interior Gerald Darmanin.

While traveling to the headquarters of the Directorate General of Internal Security (DGSI), Mr. Darmanin stressed that the terrorist threat "remained extremely high on the territory", specifying that the "terrorist risk of Sunni origin remained the main threat to which our country is facing ".

Two days before the opening of the trial of the Charlie Hebdo and Hyper Cacher attacks in January 2015, the Minister of the Interior assured that "the fight against Islamist terrorism was a top priority for the government".

"We will wage a relentless fight (...) we will never give up relentlessly tracking down these enemies of the Republic", he insisted.

Nevertheless, for him, it is "the endogenous threat (projects of terrorist acts developed on the territory, Editor's note) which is" the most significant and the strongest. "" It is fed by the propaganda of terrorist groups, inspired by veterans of Jihad, but also by the hold that supporters of radical Islam strive to have in some of our neighborhoods, ”he added.

The minister estimated that "the threat represented by individuals followers of radical Islam (...) becomes (is) a growing challenge for the intelligence services which now ensure the follow-up of 8,132 individuals registered with the FSPRT".

Faced with the magnitude of the challenges in the fight against terrorism, Gérald Darmanin emphasized the additional resources allocated to the DGSI, which will see its staff increase by "1,260 agents throughout the five-year term".

He confirmed that this department would move soon, to Saint-Ouen, thanks to the purchase made at the beginning of the year of land previously occupied by the newspaper Le Parisien.

The operation "amounts to more than a billion euros", he said.

Addressing the issue of the upcoming release of the "505 Islamist terrorist detainees linked to the Islamist movement", to which he added "702 common law detainees susceptible to radicalization", he argued that it was a " major security challenge ".

"In 2020, he said, the release forecasts are evaluated at 45 detainees for acts of terrorist association", and in 2021 at "63 Islamist terrorists sentenced".

Gérald Darmanin also called for vigilance concerning "other forms of action" emanating "from small radical groups or isolated individuals in favor of recourse to violence".

He cited in this regard the arrest last May in Limoges of a "supremacist", who wanted to attack Jewish places of worship.

© 2020 AFP