French President Francois Hollande  is surrounded by heads of state, including  Britain’s Prime Minister David Cameron, Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, Mali’s President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel, European Council President Donald Tusk and Italy’s Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, as they attend the solidarity march  in the streets of Paris yesterday.

Reuters/Paris


World leaders, including Muslim and Jewish statesmen, linked arms to lead an estimated million-plus French citizens through Paris in an unprecedented march under high security to pay tribute to victims of militant attacks.
Paris police said the turnout was “without precedent”.
The interior ministry said that at least 3.7mn people had demonstrated in France yesterday.
A ministry spokesman said that 1.2mn to 1.6mn people had marched in Paris and about 2.5mn people in other cities around the country.
The ministry said it was the biggest popular demonstration ever registered in the country.
Some commentators said the last street presence in the capital on this scale was at the Liberation of Paris from Nazi Germany in 1944.
President Francois Hollande and leaders from Germany, Italy, Israel, Turkey, Britain and the Palestinian territories among others, moved off from the central Place de la Republique ahead of a sea of French and other flags. 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.
The march mostly went ahead in a respectful silence, reflecting shock over the worst militant 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.
In London, several landmarks including Tower Bridge were 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 a militant attack on London’s transport system in 2005.
Seventeen people, including journalists and police, were killed in three days of violence that began with a shooting attack on the weekly Charlie Hebdo known for its satirical articles and cartoons. It ended on Friday with a hostage-taking at a Jewish deli in which four hostages and the gunman were killed.
Hours before the march, a video emerged featuring a man resembling the gunman killed in the kosher deli. He pledged allegiance to the Islamic State insurgent group and urged French Muslims to follow his example.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, British Prime Minister David Cameron and Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi were among 44 foreign leaders marching with Hollande. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas were also present.
Immediately to Hollande’s left, walked Merkel and to his right Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita. France intervened to help fight Islamist rebels there two years ago to the day.
In a rare public display of emotion by two major-power leaders, cameras showed Hollande embracing Merkel, her eyes shut and forehead resting on his cheek, on the steps of the Elysee before they headed off to march.
After world leaders left the march, Hollande stayed to greet survivors of the Charlie Hebdo attack and their families.
While there has been widespread solidarity with the victims, there have been dissenting voices. French social media have carried comments from those uneasy with the “Je suis Charlie” slogan interpreted as freedom of expression at all cost. Others suggest there was hypocrisy in world leaders whose countries have repressive media laws attending the march. Page 16