A series of what French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal called "coordinated" arson attacks broke out on Friday on three of France's four high-speed rail lines, disrupting the travel plans of over 1M weekend commuters ahead of the opening ceremony for the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.
Attal called the fires "acts of sabotage," with prosecutors in Paris opening a criminal investigation. The chief executive officer of SNCF, a French rail company, said that the fires were mostly set in pipes that contained cables needed for signaling.