World leaders including Muslim and Jewish statesmen linked arms to lead an estimated 3.7 million French citizens through Paris in an unprecedented march under high security to pay tribute to victims of Islamist militant attacks.
Paris police said the turnout was “without precedent” but too large to count.
Some commentators said the last street presence in the capital on this scale was at the liberation of Paris from Nazi Germany in 1944.
Prime Minister Joseph Muscat joined President Francois Hollande and leaders from Germany, Italy, Israel, Turkey, Britain and the Palestinian territories, among others, as they moved off from the central Place de la Republique ahead of a sea of French and other flags.
Prime Minister Joseph Muscat during the march. Photo: DOI“This was truly a historic day. It was a show of unity across nations, political affiliation and religion. The atmosphere in Paris was both tense and sombre. Three must be a resolve not to transform this into a clash of civilisations,” said Dr Muscat.
It was a show of unity across nations
“No country is spared from the threat of terrorism. That is why yesterday’s Marche Republicaine was a clear message that there are people of goodwill from all races, nations and religions.”
Giant letters attached to a statue in the square spelt out the word Pourquoi? (Why?) and small groups sang the La Marseillaise national anthem.
Some 2,200 police and soldiers patrolled Paris streets to protect marchers from would-be attackers, with police snipers on rooftops and plain-clothes detectives mingling with the crowd.
City sewers were searched ahead of the vigil and underground train stations around the march route were due to be closed down.
The march mostly went ahead in a respectful silence, reflecting shock over the worst militant Islamist assault on a European city in nine years. For France, it raised questions of free speech, religion and security, and beyond French frontiers it exposed the vulnerability of states to urban attacks.
Two of the gunmen had declared allegiance to al Qaeda in Yemen and a third to the militant Islamic State. All three were killed during the police operations in what local commentators have called “France’s 9/11”, a reference to the September 2001 attacks on US targets by al Qaeda.
“Paris is today the capital of the world. Our entire country will rise up and show its best side,” said Hollande.
“Fantastic France! I am told there could be as many as 1.3 million to 1.5 million of us in Paris,” Francois Lamy, the lawmaker charged by the ruling Socialist Party with organising the rally, had tweeted earlier. At least 700,000 more joined vigils in other cities across France.
In London, several landmarks including Tower Bridge were due to be lit up in the red, white and blue colours of the French national flag in a show of support for the event in Paris.
Fifty-seven people were killed in an Islamist militant attack on London’s transport system in 2005.