SIX thousand police, paramilitary gendarmes, bodyguards and elite sharpshooters will be on duty to protect Pope John Paul and control crowds during his four day visit to France from tomorrow, police said.
One of the officers in charge of the security operation said the deployment was "big but quite usual for an important visit by a very high ranking personality".
An attempted bomb attack earlier this month on a rural church where the Pope is due to pray, and an assault by cream pie throwing anarchists on priests in Nantes cathedral last week, alerted police to a wide range of security risks.
"A small terrorist threat cannot be ruled out," the officer said.
A parish priest discovered the crude bomb, made with sticks of dynamite used in road building, at the shrine of Saint Louis Marie Grignion de Montfort in Saint-Laurent-sur-Sevre, a village in western France. The attackers, still at large, had scrawled the slogan. "In nomine Pope, BOUM" on a church wall.
Militant secularists plan a counter rally in Paris on Sunday while the Pope will be celebrating the 1,500th anniversary of the conversion of King Clovis to Christianity at a mass in Reims.
Police do not expect trouble at the Paris demonstration expected to be a colourful "happening", but they are prepared for possible attempts by small groups of activists to disrupt the papal ceremonies in Tours, Britanny and Reims.
Some 2,000 CRS riot police and 4,000 gendarmes will be deployed along the Pope's route.
He will be personally protected by 125 bodyguards from the police VIP Protection Unit, and 400 police intelligence officers will be on papal duty.
Elite sharpshooters of the RAID police anti-terrorism squad will be on the rooftops at key sites.
Thirteen bomb disposal teams with sniffer dogs have also been called in. The government is providing helicopters and a plane to transport the Pope between sites and the Vatican is flying in his bullet proof, glass topped Pope mobile.
To protect worshippers, some 180 professional and amateur firemen France's all purpose rescue workers will be on duty and three major hospitals will be on alert to treat the Pope in an emergency and handle any casualties.
Meanwhile, the Catholic Church in France has added its moral weight to a chorus of condemnation of the National Front leader, Mr Jean Marie Le Pen, for espousing racial inequality, saying it was unacceptable to Christians.