PROTESTS, HIGH ALERT BEFORE PARIS CLIMATE CONFERENCE
France implemented exceptional security measures Sunday as nearly 150 world leaders gather here for a climate change summit barely two weeks after the multiple terrorist attacks that struck the French capital.
About 2,800 French police are guarding the Le Bourget conference center 7 miles north of central Paris, where President Obama will attend Monday’s opening of the 12-day summit, along with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
The conference will be one of the largest international gatherings ever held in France and may set a record for the number of presidents and prime ministers under one roof outside of the United Nations General Assembly in New York.
It comes as France’s security forces are on full alert for additional terror plots and with some suspects still at large.
Early Monday, Obama made an unannounced stop at the Bataclan concert hall, site of the worst of the Paris attacks, according to pool reports. He was met there by French President François Hollande. Obama stood for a minute of silence before laying down a single white rose at the memorial without saying a word.
On Sunday, dozens of police vans circled the vicinity of the conference and spotters were placed on overpasses and other structures. Some sections of major highways and roads that link Le Bourget to central Paris were closed. Heightened security was also apparent along Le Bourget’s main street, where many shops and restaurants were shuttered.
In Paris and throughout France, thousands more police tightened border checks and enforced emergency security legislation that allows Hollande to ban public demonstrations and place many people, including climate activists, under house arrest.
That did not stop a group of demonstrators Sunday from forming a human chain along the previously planned route of a climate protest that was called off by the government after the attacks.
A separate event saw hundreds of pairs of shoes, including pairs from Pope Francis and U.N. Secretary- General Ban Ki Moon, left on Place de la Republique to invoke the canceled marches.
Those demonstrations were marred by violence Sunday when several hundred protesters, some in masks, clashed with police.
Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said 174 people were jailed for possible charges.
On Monday, billionaire philanthropist and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates is to kick off the summit by unveiling a multibillion-dollar clean energy research and development initiative in partnership with several governments, the French government said Sunday.