WHY IS THE JIHADIST THREAT HIGHER IN FRANCE?

The recent knife attack on the Prefecture of Police in Paris by one of its officials -who managed to introduce his weapons and kill four of his comrades- reminds us of the constant terrorist threat to which our neighbouring country is exposed. In recent years, particularly since the attacks on Charlie Hebdo and Bataclan in 2015, France has been subjected to an intense campaign of Jihadist attacks that led to the declaration of a state of emergency and its maintenance until November 2017. 

Among the reasons for focusing terrorist action on France, the French government itself points out three: (i) its status as a former colonial power, often invoked by terrorist organizations as a source of grievances due to the alleged mistreatment of the Muslim inhabitants of these colonies; (ii) the level of freedoms it enjoys and which France projects as a universal nation, causing terrorists to regard Paris as "the city of abominations and perversion"; and (iii) France's recent foreign policy, given its participation in the Syrian conflict and the leadership adopted in the fight against terrorism in Libya and Mali. 

The Jihadist threats identified by the French Ministry of the Interior fall thus into three categories: 

• Terrorists returned from the Syrian-Iraqi conflict zone (or Foreign Terrorist Fighters -FTF- in the terminology coined by United Nations Security Council Resolution 2178(2014)). It is no coincidence that France is one of the European countries that has contributed most -unintentionally, of course- with its nationals to the formation of the self-proclaimed Islamic State. Thus, although the figures are not exact, it is estimated that over 1,000 (of the 5,000 that Europol estimates come from all over Europe) French nationals have travelled to conflict zones since the proclamation of the Caliphate in 2014, either together with their wives and families or by setting them up there. Despite the fact that many of them died in combat or were captured by the Iraqi or Syrian authorities (and sentenced to death or life imprisonment in many cases), it is estimated that in July 2018 there were 718 French people (or residents of France) left in the zone, 50 percent of whom were men (notwithstanding those who continue to be discovered in the framework of the US operation Gallant Phoenix which seeks to identify the many foreigners present in detention camps in Iraq). The problem of the returnees is not only that they might set up terrorist networks and commit attacks on their return to France, but that their mass imprisonment would generate genuine training and radicalization centers and consequently eventual new terrorist cells in already overcrowded prisons). Not for nothing are there currently 512 people in prison convicted of terrorism and a further 1,145 common criminals at high risk of radicalization, of whom 402 are due to be released before the end of 2019.

• The lone wolves. This type of individual terrorist, often quickly self-radicalized or even converted (25%), need not have travelled to conflict zones (sometimes being prevented from doing so is precisely what motivates them) and are simply inspired by the terrorist discourse of the organizations. It has been pointed out that they are normally individuals with little training and a background in common crime. So far they have been using homemade means (such as in Trèbes and Carcassone in 2018 or the explosion in Lyon this year) or vehicles stolen for this purpose (Nice), though it cannot be ruled out that such attacks are becoming more sophisticated in the case of returnees with specialized training. According to data from the Ministry of the Interior, over 2,000 individuals in France are at high risk of religious radicalization or being recruited by a Jihadist organization, and up to 10,500 have an 'S' file (Surété de l'État) on radical Islamism, which makes it extremely difficult to monitor and control all of them. 

• Finally, there is the threat of attacks organized directly by a terrorist organization at source. Daesh's loss of most of its territory could therefore lead to the internationalization of its action, organizing and perpetrating terrorist actions in Western countries. 

The threats described above are the reason why, despite the lifting of the state of emergency in November 2017 (due to its high social, political and economic cost), a high level of alert has been maintained. Thus, in the Vigipirate alert scheme (launched in 1991), during the past summer season (from 7 May to 18 October) the second level of "enhanced security due to risk of attack" was maintained, above the basic level of "surveillance" but below the extreme "emergency due to attack". This means that the security is reinforced in (i) tourist sites and large conurbations specific to the season (festivals, sporting events); (ii) public transport, especially in tourist destinations; (iii) heritage sites, especially during European Heritage Days; and (iv) schools and universities at the start of the year. 

In the long term, the recent Action Plan against Terrorism of 13 July 2018 aims to set out France's strategy in this area by identifying 32 public actions based on four pillars: knowledge, prevention, protection and repression.