France’s Macron promises merciless fight against terror
NICE, FRANCE — French President Emmanuel Macron on Friday vowed to “fight without mercy” inside and outside France to end extremist attacks like the one that killed 86 revelers on Bastille Day in the Riviera city of Nice one year ago.
In a speech on the anniversary of the atrocity, Macron said “this is what we owe you.” Some of the victims and their families present as well as dignitaries and the corps of first responders, from police to rescue crews and hospital workers, were among those he addressed.
Commemorations followed celebrations on Bastille Day for Macron, who traveled to Nice for a solemn remembrance of the lives lost on July 14, 2016, when a huge truck barreled down a famed beachside promenade, running over revelers awaiting the fireworks display on France’s national day.
The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attack, though it remains unclear whether the Tunisian at the wheel of the truck, a longtime Nice resident, had any formal links to the organization.
Fireworks were lighting up the Paris sky on Friday night near the Eiffel Tower, but they were banned in Nice.
The solemnity in a city still coping with the aftermath of the attack was in sharp contrast to the pomp and display of French military might at the Bastille Day parade hours earlier in the French capital before Macron’s guest of honor, President Donald Trump. There, U.S. soldiers joined the traditional military parade, a bow to the centennial of the entry of U.S. soldiers into World War I, fighting and dying alongside the French, and to French-U.S. friendship.
In Nice, the honors went to victims of the carnage last year as the city, which is considered the jewel of the Riviera and best known as a center of carefree urban life, tries to move forward without forgetting.
In a deeply moving sequence of the day-long commemoration, the names of the victims, from toddlers to a 92-yearold, were read aloud and posted on a board to form the shape of a heart. The sequence, accompanied by a choir, with at least one member holding back tears, ended with a minute of silence.
The reading of names underscored the nature of a threat that leaves everyone a potential target and is blind to the military power like that on display in Paris in the morning.