PARIS.- An alleged sympathizer neo-Nazi A Frenchman has been sentenced to two years in prison for making online threats and suspected of planning an attack at the Olympic torch relay, authorities said Saturday.
The Paris prosecutor’s office said in a statement that the 19-year-old was convicted after a speedy trial on Friday on charges of sharing bomb-making instructions on social media, as well as hate messages and death threats, as well as posting personal information that endangered the lives of others.
The suspect, who was arrested Wednesday morning at his home in the Alsace region, was the leader of a group called the “French Aryan Division” on the social network Telegram, the statement said.
The prosecutor’s office said the alleged comments prompted an investigation by the unit dedicated to combating online hate, particularly targeting the Paris Olympics, which open next Friday with a ceremony amid heightened concerns about security.
The Minister of the Interior of FranceGerald Darmanin said Wednesday that anti-terrorist police arrested the suspect and that he was an alleged neo-Nazi sympathizer suspected of “evidently wanting to intervene during a stage of the torch relay.”
The relay is about to end after a month-long tour of France before the start of the Games next Friday.
An old acquaintance:
Darmanin, who is acting interior minister until a new government is formed after parliamentary elections, said the suspect had previously been singled out by police “for his far-right ideas, which were determined to be neo-Nazi.”
“We know that he previously had the desire to attack political targets and migrants,” he said.
The security operation in Paris for its first Olympics in nearly 100 years involves up to 45,000 police and gendarmes, as well as a military force of more than 10,000 who will patrol the streets and sites of the capital region, as well as carry out security missions.
