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France to implement special anti-terrorism measures for World Cup
PARIS (AP) -- France will beef up existing anti-terrorism measures to guarantee security during this year's World Cup finals, Interior Minister Jean-Pierre Chevenement said Friday.Chevenement, speaking at the end of a two-day seminar of European police officers, said France would "reinforce" the extraordinary measures put in place after a spate of 1995 bombings.
Eight people were killed and 160 others injured in the bombings, most of which occurred in Paris. Muslim militants supporting an Islamic insurgency in Algeria were convicted of the bombings.
The security measures, known as Operation Vigipirate, included heavier police presence in train and subway stations, public buildings and monuments. Trash cans were either removed from city streets or sealed up. Steel barricades were set up outside schools.
The seminar brought together representatives of 14 police forces specializing in the fight against soccer hooliganism.
Chevenement told a news conference there would be "heavy penalties" during the June 10-July 12 tournament for "drunken behavior, introducing banned objects into stadiums such as knives, or inciting racial hatred."
Punishment for such offences will include jail terms and bans from attending matches in France for five years, the minister said.
He warned it wasn't just talk, saying a magistrate would be assigned to each stadium during the finals to monitor arrests and assure swift judicial punishment.
On Friday, soccer's world governing body FIFA reacted to protests from several countries by banning the production of souvenir pocket knives commemorating the tournament.
The French companies making the hunting knives had agreed to stop making them, said a FIFA spokesman, who requested anonymity.
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GROUP A: Brazil, Morocco, Norway, Scotland
GROUP B: Austria, Cameroon, Chile, Italy
GROUP C: Denmark, France, Saudi Arabia, South Africa
GROUP D: Bulgaria, Nigeria, Paraguay, Spain
GROUP E: Belgium, Holland, Mexico, South Korea
GROUP F: Germany, Iran, United States, Yugoslavia
GROUP G: Colombia, England, Romania, Tunisia
GROUP H: Argentina, Croatia, Jamaica, Japan