The French interior minister suggested the perpetrators of arson attacks may have been 'manipulated'
The French authorities blamed ‘night-time sabotage’ on the fiber optic networks run by SFR suffered its second multi-site sabotage attack on key infrastructure in recent days when phone and internet cables were severed overnight on Monday at five sites across the country.
Officials said disruption was limited because of the ability to re-route internet and phone traffic via other parts of the network. But SFR said services to about 10,000 fixed line customers had been affected along with coverage from a number of mobile phone masts. Travellers outside the Gare Montparnasse train station in Paris after vandals targeted France’s high-speed train network
The interior minister told French media that the attack was “the far-left’s traditional mode of action”, but left open the possibility that the perpetrators’ actions could have been the subject of external influence. He said: “The question to answer is if they have been manipulated or acted on their own account?”
But Arthur Laudrain, a cyber-security expert at King’s College London’s Department of War Studies, said the possibility of a “state-actor” being involved behind the scenes also cannot be discounted. Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman, said there was a kneejerk response in the West to “blame Russia for everything that is happening”. He added: “These are just the latest fakes – more unsubstantiated accusations.”in the last two years have been blamed on sabotage and allegations of Russian influenced operations. The Kremlin is known to operate a force of deep cover intelligence operatives – called Unit 29155 – tasked with carrying out attacks abroad.
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