Attack in Paris: “Every time there is a tragedy, it is a collective failure”, judges Clément Beaune

Three days after the fatal knife attack in Paris near the Eiffel Tower, the custody of Armand Rajabpour-Miyandoab, a Franco-Iranian, continues this Tuesday. This 26-year-old man was on file S, known to the police for his radical Islamism and his psychiatric disorders. He said he acted in “reaction to the persecution of Muslims around the world” and declared “totally accepting and vindicating his actions”.

“Every time there is a tragedy, it is a failure. A collective failure,” declared Clément Beaune, Minister Delegate in charge of Transport, guest of La Grande interview Europe 1-CNews on Tuesday.

“A failure” in the psychiatric follow-up of the terrorist

Could there be a “psychiatric failure”, as Gérald Darmanin asserts, or a political flaw as the opposition denounces? “We have a rule of law, he was convicted, he served his sentence. We can clearly see those who have the magic wand and who say ‘it was enough to keep him (in prison editor’s note) forever'”, launched the minister, detailing the psychiatric medical treatment followed throughout his detention and after his release.

“There was an injunction for follow-up, including psychiatric follow-up, for four years. At the end of this follow-up, there was a medical diagnosis which noted that on a psychiatric level, there was no longer the need for restrictive monitoring. Should we strengthen these measures or should we, as the government mentioned on Sunday evening, require additional injunctions?” asked Clément Beaune.

Plans for attacks foiled every month

According to the Minister Delegate for Transport, finding exceptional measures for these very dangerous profiles would undermine the rule of law. “This is the debate that there is, for example, on S files. Should the fact of being S file, which is a tool of our intelligence services, an administrative tool, give rise in itself, for example, some say, to a form of condemnation or even eternal confinement? Plans for attacks are foiled every month. Nor should a tragedy call into question all the efforts that have already been made. “We need to go further on certain measures? Certainly. But to make people believe that an administrative file can be a court decision would be serious,” he said on Europe 1-CNews.

Convicted in 2016 for a planned attack in La Défense

Born in France to Iranian refugee parents, residing in Essonne, the 26-year-old man had already been arrested by domestic intelligence (DGSI) in 2016 for a planned attack in La Défense, a business district in the west from Paris. In this case, Armand Rajabpour-Miyandoab received five years in prison, one of which was suspended, and was released in 2020 after four years of detention, sources close to the case said.

His mother told the police at the end of October that she was worried about her son who was “withdrawing into himself”. This Franco-Iranian was arrested after the attack which caused the death of a 23-year-old German-Filipino tourist and injured two other people on Saturday evening near the Bir-Hakeim bridge.