PARIS: Preparations for the Paris Olympics stepped up a gear on Saturday as security teams scoured the banks of the Seine ahead of Friday’s opening ceremony and top International Olympic Committee officials met in the French capital.

Police with sniffer dogs checked the six-kilometre route along the Seine for the ceremony in which around 6,000-7,000 athletes will sail on nearly a hundred barges and riverboats in front of 300,000 spectators.

French police will be bolstered by colleagues from several countries, including Spain, Britain and Qatar.

Early on Saturday, a rehearsal for the ceremony was held on the river but security barriers and police screened it from the eyes of residents and media.

The stakes are high for the waterborne parade; the first time the opening ceremony of a Summer Games will take place outside a stadium.

The preparations for the ceremony have caused extensive disruption to residents of central Paris, who must have a pass with a special QR code to cross the Seine.

“We’ve had far fewer customers than usual for the last two weeks. There aren’t many tourists and lots of Parisians have left town. All our local clientele has gone,” said Behi Samadian, 69, in a boutique in Saint-Germain-des-Pres.

Team delegations have started to check into the athletes’ village but some arrivals were delayed by Friday’s global IT crash.

“Like a lot of organisations, we suffered this global Microsoft outage,” the Games chief organiser Tony Estanguet told reporters on Friday. “All of our servers were affected this morning.”

However, the accreditation systems were working again by Friday evening. In better news for organisers, the ticketing systems were not affected.

Organisers say 8.7 million tickets have already been sold, beating the record from the 1996 Atlanta Olympics and that figure will rise because tickets are still on sale for some of the 45 sports.

Some of the athletes expected to be the biggest stars of the Games, including American sprinter Noah Lyles, will compete for a final time before the Olympics at the Diamond League meeting in London on Saturday.

The IOC’s top brass, led by President Thomas Bach, will meet on Saturday to prepare for the larger IOC Session later this week.

Behind the scenes, the allocation of the 2030 Winter Olympics to the French Alps — they are the only candidates — risks being delayed by a row over the French government’s reluctance to give funding guarantees.

Russia will be the big absentee from the Paris Games, with just 15 Russians and 16 Belarusians accredited as most sports have turned their backs on the Russians after the invasion of Ukraine.

Those allowed to compete at the Games have had to meet strict criteria on neutrality, but Global Rights Compliance, a Hague-based human rights foundation, said two-thirds of the Russians selected had expressed support for Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine or have links to the military.

In a statement to AFP, the IOC said Friday it would not comment on individual cases.

Published in Dawn, July 21st, 2024