FRENCH Prime Minister Manuel Valls was booed in Nice before and after the minute of silence for the victims of the deadly Bastille Day attack.
Shouts of “Murderers!” and “Resign!” rang out as Valls and two ministers left the seafront where a huge crowd gathered to remember the 84 people mowed down on July 14 by truck driver Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, an AFP reporter said.
Emotions in France have been running high since the 31-year-old Tunisian rammed a 19-tonne truck into a crowd leaving a fireworks display, leaving a trail of crumpled bodies in his wake.
Opposition parties have accused the Socialist government of not doing enough to prevent the third major attack in France in 18 months.
The government has attempted to fend off the criticism, saying that Lahouaiej-Bouhlel had no known links to jihadist networks and claiming he became radicalised only recently.
Similar gatherings were held across the country, with the minute’s silence accompanied by the ringing of church bells.
French investigators have yet to find links between attacker Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, and the Islamic State group which claimed responsibility for Thursday’s carnage, Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve told France’s RTL radio.
He defended government efforts to halt terror attacks, calling for “dignity and truth” from fiercely critical opposition politicians as the national mood soured further nine months ahead of a presidential election.
France was wrapping up a three-day period of national mourning after Lahouaiej-Bouhlel zigzagged a 19-tonne truck through a crowd of tourists, locals and families enjoying a fireworks display in the Riviera city of Nice on Bastille Day.
People gather on the famed Promenade des Anglais in Nice, southern France, to observe a minute of silence near the area where a truck mowed through revellers. Picture: AP
“We must not move on too quickly. We need to exorcise our demons, to talk about it, to gather together,” said Philippe Gambino, who has visited the Promenade des Anglais every day since the attack, where candles and flowers form a makeshift memorial.
The attack came eight months after IS jihadists killed 130 people across Paris, and 18 months after three days of terror at the Charlie Hebdo weekly and a Jewish supermarket killed 17.
Former president and main opposition leader Nicolas Sarkozy said Sunday that “everything that should have been done the past 18 months was not done”.
“We are at war, outright war. So I will use strong words: it will be us or them,” he said.
‘Shameful’ politicians
While previous attacks saw grand displays of national unity, there was no semblance of cohesion after the Nice massacre, with Sarkozy joining a long line of opposition politicians who have accused the government of not doing enough to protect the French.
Cazeneuve described the bitter debate as “shameful”.................. |
|