France Unbowed MP sparks outrage by saying Israeli Olympians not welcome

Thomas Portes accused of ‘putting a target on the backs of Israeli athletes’ with remarks at protest against Gaza war

An MP for the radical-left France Unbowed party has sparked outrage after saying Israeli athletes are not welcome at the Paris Olympics and calling for protests against their presence.

Citing Israel’s war in Gaza, Thomas Portes told a pro-Palestinian gathering in Paris on Saturday: “We are just a few days away from an international event to be held in Paris, the Olympic Games. And I’m here to say that no, the Israeli delegation is not welcome in Paris. Israeli athletes are not welcome at the Olympic Games in Paris. We have to use this deadline and all the levers we have to mobilise.”

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‘It’s a very strange feeling’: can the man who won Olympic gold bring glory to the Paris Games?

2024 Games organiser Tony Estanguet tells how chats with British sporting legend Sebastian Coe have kept him on an even keel

It has to feel pretty weird. You’re in charge of the biggest event your country’s ever organised. You have worked on it to the exclusion, basically, of everything else in your life, for very nearly a decade. And now – it’s a week away.

“It’s a very strange feeling,” confirms Tony Estanguet, head of the 2024 Olympic Games organising committee. “I come from this small town in south-west France. My sport is a very minor one. It’s been … quite a ride. But here I am. And now, well, here we all are.”

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Paris mayor swims in Seine as river is cleaned up just in time for Olympics

Anne Hidalgo fulfils pledge after cleanup operation makes water quality safe enough to host events at Games

It has been the dream and promise of Paris mayors for decades and a nightmare for Olympic organisers: could the Seine be cleaned up enough to swim in and hold triathlon and other events?

For the last 100 years and up until a few days ago, the answer seemed to be no.

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Paris mayor says rise of far right will not dampen Olympics mood

Anne Hidalgo says Paris ‘stands up for freedom’ amid Marine Le Pen success in first round of voting

The Paris mayor has sought to reassure visitors that the festive mood at the Olympics will not be dampened by Marine Le Pen’s electoral successes in France’s snap parliamentary elections, with less than a month to go before the city hosts the Games.

“The party will not be spoilt,” Socialist mayor Anne Hidalgo told broadcaster France 2 on Tuesday. “I say to visitors from the world over – come over! Because Paris is a city that stands up for freedom and is a city of resistance against the extreme right.”

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Thousands of homeless people removed from Paris region in pre-Olympics ‘social cleansing’

Campaigners say operation to bus ‘undesirable’ people out of city and wider Île-de-France region has intensified

Thousands of homeless people have been removed from Paris and the surrounding area as part of a “clean-up” operation ahead of the Olympic Games, campaigners say.

Those moved on include asylum seekers, as well as families and children already in a precarious and vulnerable situation, the collective Le Revers de la Médaille, which represents 90 associations, said in a report released on Monday.

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Teenager arrested in France on suspicion of Olympics attack plot

Interior ministry says 18-year-old Chechen suspected of planning ‘Islamist-inspired’ attack in Saint-Étienne

French security services have arrested a Chechen teenager suspected of plotting an “Islamist-inspired” attack on a football game during this summer’s Olympics, the interior ministry has said.

The domestic intelligence agency DGSI arrested an 18-year-old of Chechen origin in Saint-Étienne, in south-east France, the ministry said on Friday, calling it the “first foiled attack against the Olympic Games”.

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Olympic Games’ €1.4bn clean-up aims to get Parisians swimming in the Seine

Organisers expect 75% of identified bacterial pollution will be gone by the time the starting gun fires for the open water events

Beside a sign saying “No swimming”, Pierre Fuzeau defiantly pulled on his swimming cap, slipped into the green water of the Ourcq canal on Paris’s northern edge, and set off with a strong front-crawl.

The 66-year-old company director regularly joins his open-water swimming group for well-organised illegal dips, including in the River Seine, where swimming has been banned since 1923 largely as a result of the health risk from unclean water and bacteria from human waste.

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Ukraine athletes warned to ignore Russian provocation at Olympics

  • Sports minister tells his country’s squad to keep a ‘cold head’
  • ‘We consider Russian athletes to be agents of hybrid influence’

The acting sports minister of Ukraine, Matviy Bidnyi, has told his country’s athletes to keep a “cold head” and pay no attention to any provocation from their Russian counterparts at the Olympic Games this summer.

Speaking to the Guardian at the ministry of youth and sports in Kyiv, Bidnyi predicted that Russia will use its representatives in Paris as part of their propaganda operation and explained recommendations have been drawn up to help the Ukraine team avoid becoming embroiled in controversy.

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Super-rich spending up to $500,000 on exclusive Paris Olympics packages

Third-party hospitality packages are outlawed, yet agency part-owned by associates of Rafael Nadal and LeBron James promises access to top events as well as to stars

Members of the global super-rich are spending as much as $500,000 (£400,000) on “ultra-exclusive” packages for the Paris 2024 Olympics that promoters claim include meeting athletes, access to the athletes’ village and “the chance to be part of the opening ceremony”.

GR8 Experience, an “international experience agency” part-owned by the business manager of the basketball star LeBron James and the PR manager of the tennis player Rafael Nadal, is selling Olympic packages that it claims include tickets to 14 events such as the men’s 100m finals and the opening ceremony for $381,600.

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Aya Nakamura thanks fans for support over Olympics racism as she wins awards

French singer dedicates top prizes at Les Flammes ‘to all black women’ after backlash over rumoured Paris show

The French pop star Aya Nakamura, who found herself at the centre of a racist row after rumours she was going to sing at the Paris Olympics opening ceremony, has thanked fans for their support after winning three big prizes at France’s Les Flammes awards for rap, R&B and pop.

“I’m very honoured because being a black artist and coming from the banlieue is very difficult,” Nakamura told the audience at the ceremony, which she opened with a medley of her songs. She dedicated her awards – female artist of the year, pop album of the year, and international star of the year – “to all black women”.

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The 1924 Paris Olympics saved the Games. Can this year’s event repeat that success? | David Goldblatt

Faced with competition from rival sporting events, the future of the Games hung in the balance. A century on, new hurdles are looming

Paris 1924 was the sixth and last Olympics presided over by Baron de Coubertin, the modern movement’s founder. He had good reason to be pleased with his work. The French government had enthusiastically backed the enterprise, providing a budget of 20m francs and a new stadium. The Olympic rituals – the parade of nations, the rings, the oath, gold, silver and bronze medals – had been established.

Above all, the Games remained the preserve of amateur athletic gentlemen – aristocrats, college kids and military officers – performing what the baron eulogised as “a display of manly virtue”.

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Hundreds evicted from France’s biggest squat months before Paris Olympics

Charities say authorities want to clear homeless people from streets and squats to make city look better for Games

Police have evicted hundreds of people from the biggest squat in France, in a southern suburb of Paris, prompting fresh accusations from charities that authorities are seeking to clear refugees, asylum seekers and homeless people from the capital area before the Olympics.

The squat, in an abandoned bus company headquarters in Vitry-sur-Seine, had been home to up to 450 people, many of whom had refugee status, legal paperwork and jobs in France, but who could not find proper housing. As they left the building they were encouraged to board buses to other parts of France.

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‘A message of peace’: Olympic flame begins its journey to Paris

Torch lit in ruins of ancient Olympia, Greek birthplace of Games, starting 3,100-mile relay that will end in July

A taste of the drama and beauty of this summer’s Paris Olympics has unfolded in the foothills of Greece with the lighting of the flame that will illuminate the world’s biggest sports event.

In a ceremony held amid the ruins of ancient Olympia, the birthplace of the Games 2,800 years ago, the flame was kindled by performers dressed as priestesses, though this year because of weather conditions the torch was not ignited as usual in a parabolic mirror – which focuses the sun’s rays – but from a flame lit during a rehearsal.

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Paris Olympics opening ceremony could move if threat detected, says Macron

French president says location of spectacle, due to take place on Seine, could change if there is serious risk of terror attack

France has backup plans to move the opening ceremony of the 2024 Olympic Games from the Seine if there is a serious risk of a terrorist attack, Emmanuel Macron has said.

Speaking in a television interview on Monday, the French president said organisers “could and would” continue to plan for a “world first” opening ceremony for 26 July, when more than 300,000 people are expected to watch a flotilla of boats carrying national teams down the river.

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Macron supports Nakamura’s ‘rightful place’ at Olympic opening ceremony

French president in favour of singer opening the Games amid racist backlash from far-right politicians

Emmanuel Macron has said the French pop superstar Aya Nakamura would be in her rightful place performing at an opening ceremony for the Olympic Games this summer, after suggestions that she could sing an Édith Piaf song sparked a racist backlash against the singer.

Asked about Nakamura, who is the most listened to French-speaking artist in the world, Macron said it would be a “good thing” if she performed at an opening or closing ceremony.

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France assesses Paris Olympics terrorist threat in light of Moscow attack

Minister and intelligence services meet to discuss security for Games that includes opening ceremony on the Seine

The French interior minister, Gérald Darmanin, has met intelligence services to assess the terrorist threat to the country, after the Moscow concert hall attack claimed by Islamic State raised fresh security fears over the Paris Olympics.

One of the biggest security challenges facing the organisers of the Games in the French capital is to protect the opening ceremony on 26 July. It is planned to be an unprecedented, open-air extravaganza, which for the first time in Olympic history will not take place within the confines of a stadium, but instead involve a flotilla of 94 boats carrying thousands of waving athletes down a 6km (3.7-mile) stretch of the Seine, followed by a further 80 boats carrying media and security, while an estimated 222,000 people gather along the river’s edge and 200,000 more watch from buildings.

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Aya Nakamura, the pop superstar at the centre of a Paris Olympic racism storm

Outrage from the far right over rumours of a performance at the opening ceremony has exposed deep divisions in France

She is the most listened-to French singer in the world, whose relentlessly catchy hits about love and betrayal have been streamed 7bn times and who made history last year when she sold out three Paris gigs in 15 minutes.

But Aya Nakamura, France’s biggest pop superstar who is known for her unique French style influenced by Afrobeats and Caribbean zouk, called out racism and ignorance this week after far-right politicians expressed outrage over the possibility that she could sing at the Paris Olympics.

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Bag containing security plans for Paris Olympics stolen from French train

City hall engineer had put bag with sensitive data in overhead luggage rack on train at Gare du Nord

A bag containing a computer and two USB memory sticks holding police security plans for the Paris Olympic Games has been stolen from a train at the capital’s Gare du Nord station.

The bag belonged to an engineer from Paris city hall, the police said late on Tuesday, confirming a report by BFM television, adding that he had put the bag in the luggage compartment above his seat.

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British police and security services to help protect Paris Olympics

France and UK also agree to deploy more drones and sea barriers to stop small boats crossing Channel

UK security experts will help France to protect the Paris Olympics in a sign of closer cooperation, the Home Office has said.

Both governments also plan to deploy more drones and sea barriers to prevent small boats carrying asylum seekers from crossing the Channel.

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French police protest for better pay and conditions during Paris Olympics

Unions call for bonuses and childcare provision after suggestion all officers will be mobilised during Games

Police in France are holding a “Black Thursday” of work stoppages and demonstrations to demand better pay and conditions during this summer’s Olympic Games.

Several police unions, led by the two largest, Alliance and Unsa Police, said there should be bonuses of up to €2,000 (£1,720) as well as guarantees of holiday leave and childcare support for police this summer.

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