French Prime Minister, Manuel Valls, said on Wednesday in Paris that
France would spend 325.54 million pounds to recruit 4,698 extra police,
spies and investigators.
Valls said the state would hire 2,680 people in the police, justice,
intelligence and defence sectors by 2018 to boost national security and
intelligence.
The Prime Minister said that President Francois Hollande’s cabinet
accepted the measure as the first requirement to further reinforce the
human and material assets of the intelligence services.
He conceded that there could have been “shortfalls” in monitoring and justice arrangements.
“Warning the threat remained high after the most deadly terrorist attack on French soil,’’ he said.
Valls said the Muslim chaplains would also be employed to work with potential militants in France’s overcrowded jails.
“The fight against terrorism, jihad and radical Islam will be a long haul,” he said.
He said France was struggling to keep watch over an estimated 1,200
radical Islamists and some 200 people who have returned home after
fighting with militant groups in Syria and Iraq.
Valls said a possible penalty would be debated under which offenders would be stripped of certain civic rights.
This was an idea floated by the conservative opposition which mirrors
a post-World War II law barring collaborators with Nazi occupiers from
voting, holding office or working for the state. (Xinhua/NAN)
