A letter warning of the risk of an attack on Notre-Dame Cathedral this weekend was found this Friday.
The message appealed to people not to open the doors of the Paris cathedral, as knives had been hidden there to “cause carnage”.
The letter, anonymous and which alleged that an attack would be committed at Notre-Dame Cathedral during this weekend, was found this Friday afternoon by a sacristan, according to the report. Le Figarowhich cites a police source.
“Do not open the cathedral on October 11th and 12th. There will be foreign visitors who, with the help of other visitors, have already hidden knives in the cathedral in recent days. They will cause carnage. Please do not open the cathedral”said the message, placed near the candles.
Although the building was not evacuated, security forces searched the place to detect any threat.
“The searches clarified any doubts” until Friday evening, Paris municipal police said. Also on Saturday morning, “a security inspection” was carried out jointly by the cathedral’s security service and the police and which “made it possible to rule out any risk”.
Meanwhile, an investigation was opened to identify the author of the letter.
This is not the first time that Notre-Dame Cathedral has faced a situation of this type. In April, a letter was discovered on a bench inside the building that suggested a terrorist attack during the Easter weekend. “On Easter Sunday, there will be an attack on the cathedral”, read the message, which was taken seriously by the authorities, and an investigation was opened for “material threat of crime against people, committed on the basis of race, ethnicity, nation or religion” and “dissemination of false information with the aim of creating the belief in dangerous destruction”.