A suspected neo-Nazi sympathizer from France has been sentenced to two years in prison after making threats on the Internet and expressing suspicions of wanting to attack the Olympic torch relay.
The Paris public prosecutor's office announced that the 19-year-old was found guilty in a summary trial on Friday night. He is accused of distributing instructions on how to build bombs on social media, spreading hate and death threats, and posting personal data that put people at risk.
The man, who was arrested in his home in Alsace on Wednesday morning, ran a group called “French Aryan Division” on the social media channel Telegram, the statement said.
Prosecutors said his alleged comments, which sparked an investigation by their online hate unit, were not specifically directed against the Paris Olympics, which begin on Friday with an opening ceremony under tight security.
Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said on Wednesday that anti-terror police had arrested the man, who was a suspected neo-Nazi sympathizer and was suspected of “obviously being ready to intervene during a stage of the torch relay.”
The relay is nearing the end of its months-long journey through France and the French overseas territories before the opening of the Games.
Darmanin, who is acting head of the Interior Ministry until a new government is formed after parliamentary elections in early July, said the suspect had previously been noticed by police “due to right-wing extremist ideas that can be described as neo-Nazi.”
“We know that from the outset he had the desire to hit political targets or people with a migrant background,” he said.
Up to 45,000 police officers and gendarmes are involved in the security operation in the French capital for the first Olympic Games in a century, as well as a 10,000-strong military force that will patrol streets and towns in the Paris region and carry out other security missions.