Absolute' Indignation: Crowds, World Leaders Converge on Paris, Police fanned out in Paris on Sunday amid final preparations for a massive rally that is expected to draw thousands of demonstrators to the French capital in a show of solidarity but also poses a huge security challenge for a country reeling from a series of sieges.
France is on the highest level of alert following three days of violence which left 17 people dead, along with three gunmen. Security has been stepped up in France since the first deadly assault Wednesday on the Paris offices of satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.
Around 40 world leaders are expected to descend on Paris along with thousands of demonstrators. Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas are among those expected to attend the rally.
France's interior minister said "exceptional measures" will be taken to ensure security for the rally, from sweeping rooftops and gutters to posting snipers on the rooftops of Paris.
Some 2,000 police and 1,350 soldiers will provide security for the march and at sensitive sites in the city, Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuv said. There will be 150 plainclothes police protecting the public figures on hand and doing surveillance.
The rally will begin at Place de la Republique, which has become one of several memorials to the victims throughout the city. Candles and tributes to the victims and to Charlie Hebdo and free speech cover the monument.
The rally "must show the power, the dignity of the French people who will be shouting out of love of freedom and tolerance," Prime Minister Manuel Valls has said.
"Journalists were killed because they defended freedom. Policemen were killed because they were protecting you. Jews were killed because they were Jewish," he said. "The indignation must be absolute and total — not for three days only, but permanently."
