How likely is Putin to target the Paris Olympics?

One thing the French seem to be learning (or, given their history, re-learning) is that the Russians are always up for a scrap. A ministerial phone call between the two countries has led to a diplomatic spat such that a stung Emmanuel Macron is now claiming that Moscow plans to target this summer’s Paris Olympics – and he’s probably right.

On Wednesday, French defence minister Sébastien Lecornu had a rare phone conversation – the first since 2022 – with his Russian counterpart Sergei Shoigu. Paris claims that, following the Crocus City terrorist attack in Moscow last month, the call was wholly about the scope for anti-terrorist cooperation, and their willingness to share what Macron later described as ‘useful information… on the origin and organisation of this attack’. But what Paris may disingenuously regard as an altruistic expression of solidarity was inevitably interpreted by Moscow as a challenge to its (admittedly implausible) official line, that the attack was carried out by jihadists, but in a plot organised by Kyiv.

Shoigu may well not believe this conspiracy theory, but he is nonetheless required to advance it with all the determination at his disposal – and the French must, surely, have known this.