Foreign police forces exchange know-how while protecting Paris Games (2024)

The 2023 Rugby World Cup, the Vuelta and Tour de France cycling races and the 2019 G7 summit in Biarritz: This is not the first time that the Spanish police and civil guard have been involved in security operations on French soil. Nor is it the first time they have joined "mixed" patrols to support their neighbors in their day-to-day border surveillance and anti-terrorist operations.

However, the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, from July 26 to August 11, marks the largest deployment of Spanish officers for a major event in France: 142 civil guards and 171 police officers. "This includes 10 horses, each with a rider, and 10 police dogs trained in explosive detection, as well as their handlers," said the Spanish national police.

In January, the French authorities asked the Spanish Interior Ministry, via the French embassy in Spain, to deploy Spanish agents during the Games. Spanish Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska immediately agreed and decided to send a contingent comprising units from the public safety brigades, anti-drone units, services specializing in explosives detection and deactivation, traffic and border management, cavalry units, mobile brigades and rapid intervention units.

Since July 19, these officers have been deployed in 17 cities, including big ones like Paris, Nice, Lyon, and Marseille, border towns like Hendaye and Biscarrosse, and Paris's Roissy-Charles-de-Gaulle airport. In addition, 11 officials from the two police forces have joined the National Coordination for the Security of the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

'Spanish tourists felt right at home'

"I know that France is fully aware of the effort required for Spain to fulfill this commitment," stressed Grande-Marlaska during the traditional July 14 reception at the residence of the French ambassador to Spain. A former anti-terrorist judge at a time when cooperation with France was essential to put an end to terrorist attacks by the Basque separatist group ETA, Grande-Marlaska recalled that the two countries were "pioneers" in judicial cooperation, and that "no other country has such a high level of joint police work as with France."

"For decades," he noted, the interior ministries of both countries have cooperated intensively. "It is an honor for Spain to provide the largest number of highly qualified personnel to support its partner in the security of the Games," concluded Grande-Marlaska.

Spain was not the only country to assist France. A total of 1,800 police officers from 44 nations arrived for the Games, including 167 bomb disposal specialists, whose presence was coordinated by the General Directorate for Civil Security and Crisis Management. Of these forces, 1,100 were deployed in the greater Paris region, while the remaining 700 were stationed at regional sites, again under the supervision of French police officers or gendarmes.

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