Sixty-eight people were arrested and 39 placed in police custody on Saturday evening in Paris during the evening of the Champions League final, punctuated by incidents around access to the Stade de France, said the Ministry of Interior. Rare for a match of this level, the start of the meeting between Real Madrid and Liverpool (1-0) had to be delayed by half an hour, due to tensions outside the stadium.
Many supporters had tried to climb the gates of the enclosure to try to force entry. Brief scuffles then opposed the police who repelled these intruders, sometimes using tear gas. Some spectators, despite having tickets, were only able to access the stadium at the end of the first period of the match.
The Paris police headquarters said in a press release published on Saturday evening that before the match “many supporters without tickets for the match or holders of counterfeit tickets disrupted access to the Stade de France, at the level of the external security perimeter. “. Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin, in a tweet, pointed to the attitude of “thousands of British ‘supporters’ without tickets or with fake tickets who forced entry” to the Stade de France.
But the evacuation of the two separate “fan zones” – for Real Madrid supporters in Saint-Denis and for those of Liverpool in eastern Paris – took place without major incidents, the prefecture added on Twitter, referring to for these gatherings a general “good physiognomy” of the evening. A secure perimeter with giant screens, drinks and entertainment had been organized by the prefecture on the Cours de Vincennes to welcome the 40,000 English supporters of the “Reds” who did not have a ticket.
Despite the defeat, the evacuation of this high-risk perimeter took place without incident, noted an AFP journalist. The Paris fire brigade for its part evoked “a rather calm evening” in terms of support. In all, 238 people were taken care of by the various emergency services at one time of the day, for “relative emergencies”, ranging from drunkenness or minor accidents, including tear gas poisoning, a spokesman for the Paris fire department told AFP.
