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Vandals Attack French Telecoms Lines Days after Rail Sabotage

A high-speed train by French railway company SNCF travels on the Bordeaux-Paris route at reduced speed, at Chartres, northern France on July 26, 2024. AFP
A high-speed train by French railway company SNCF travels on the Bordeaux-Paris route at reduced speed, at Chartres, northern France on July 26, 2024. AFP
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Vandals Attack French Telecoms Lines Days after Rail Sabotage

A high-speed train by French railway company SNCF travels on the Bordeaux-Paris route at reduced speed, at Chartres, northern France on July 26, 2024. AFP
A high-speed train by French railway company SNCF travels on the Bordeaux-Paris route at reduced speed, at Chartres, northern France on July 26, 2024. AFP

Vandals attacked telecoms lines in parts of France overnight, disrupting some fixed and mobile services, the junior minister for digital matters, Marina Ferrari, said on X on Monday.
A police source said it was too early to tell if there was any link to sabotage on the high-speed rail network, which caused travel chaos hours before the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics on Friday.
Ferrari called the vandalism "cowardly and irresponsible" and said work was underway to get services back up and running.
According to Reuters, a spokesman for telecoms operator SFR said vandals had made cuts to its long-distance network in five different parts of France in the early hours of Monday.
The impact on clients was minimal because the network was designed to reroute traffic, he said.
Le Parisien newspaper reported earlier that cables in electrical cabinets had been cut in southern France, and that installations in the Meuse region near Luxembourg and the Oise area near Paris had been vandalized, affecting mainly fixed-line services.
Rail services only finally returned to normal on Monday morning, Transport Minister Patrice Vergriete said. Overall, around 800,000 people faced disruptions, including 100,000 whose trains had to be cancelled outright, he added.

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Quad FMs Discuss Bolstering Maritime, Cyber Defenses

(L to R) India's Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, Australia's Foreign Minister Penny Wong, Japan's Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken chat at the end of their press conference following the Quad Ministerial Meeting at the Iikura Guest House in Tokyo on July 29, 2024. (Photo by Kazuhiro NOGI / AFP)
(L to R) India's Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, Australia's Foreign Minister Penny Wong, Japan's Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken chat at the end of their press conference following the Quad Ministerial Meeting at the Iikura Guest House in Tokyo on July 29, 2024. (Photo by Kazuhiro NOGI / AFP)
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Quad FMs Discuss Bolstering Maritime, Cyber Defenses

(L to R) India's Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, Australia's Foreign Minister Penny Wong, Japan's Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken chat at the end of their press conference following the Quad Ministerial Meeting at the Iikura Guest House in Tokyo on July 29, 2024. (Photo by Kazuhiro NOGI / AFP)
(L to R) India's Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, Australia's Foreign Minister Penny Wong, Japan's Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken chat at the end of their press conference following the Quad Ministerial Meeting at the Iikura Guest House in Tokyo on July 29, 2024. (Photo by Kazuhiro NOGI / AFP)

Foreign ministers from Australia, India, Japan and the United States - a grouping known as the 'Quad' - discussed initiatives to bolster maritime security and build up cyber defenses in talks in Tokyo on Monday.

The talks attended by Australia's Penny Wong, India's Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, Japan's Yoko Kamikawa and Antony Blinken from the US, follow security discussions between Tokyo and Washington on Sunday where the allies labelled China the "greatest strategic challenge" facing the region, Reuters reported.
"We are charting a course for a more secure and open Indo-Pacific and Indian Ocean region by bolstering maritime security and domain awareness," Blinken said in remarks to the press after the meeting.

"It means strengthening the capacity of partners across the region to know what's happening in their own waters," he added.

He said the US would continue to work with its allies to ensure freedom of navigation and the unimpeded flow of lawful maritime commerce.

The US announced plans on Sunday for a major revamp of its military command in Japan to deepen coordination with its ally's forces.

It was among several measures taken to address what the US and Japan said was an "evolving security environment,” noting various threats from China including its increasingly muscular maritime activities in the East and South China Seas.

"Uncertainty surrounding the international order as well as the international situation has been increasing with Russia continuing its aggression in Ukraine, attempts to unilaterally change the status quo by force in the East China Sea and South China Sea, and the launch of ballistic missiles by North Korea," Japan's Kamikawa said after the talks.

She highlighted the need to build up cybersecurity capability and provide training opportunities in maritime security to protect and develop prosperity in Indo-Pacific.

After leaving Tokyo, Blinken and Austin will hold security talks with another Asian ally, the Philippines, as the Biden administration seeks to counter an increasingly bold China.

Blinken met his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi in Laos on Saturday and repeated that Washington and its partners want to maintain a "free and open Indo-Pacific," according to a US readout of the meeting.