PARIS: President Emmanuel Macron has vowed to rebuild Notre-Dame “even more beautifully” within five years, as all of France’s cathedrals prepared to ring their bells on Wednesday to mark 48 hours since the colossal fire began.
The blaze on Monday gutted the great Paris landmark, destroying the roof, causing the steeple to collapse and leaving France reeling with shock.
Macron announced the fast timescale for restoration — a process some experts said would take decades — in an address to the nation where he hailed how the disaster had shown the capacity of France to mobilize and unite.
Pledges worth around 700 million euros ($790 million) have already been made from French billionaires and businesses to restore the Gothic masterpiece.
An unknown number of artefacts and paintings have been lost and the main organ, which had close to 8,000 pipes, has also suffered damage.
But the cathedral’s walls, bell towers and the most famous circular stained-glass windows at France’s most visited tourist attraction remain intact.
Macron’s defiant comments indicated he wants the reconstruction of the cathedral to be completed by the time Paris hosts the Olympic Games in 2024.
“We will rebuild the cathedral even more beautifully and I want it to be finished within five years,” Macron said from the Elysee Palace. “And we can do it.”
Macron said that the dramatic fire had brought out the best in a country riven with divisions and since November shaken by sometimes violent protests against his rule.
“Our history never stops and that we will always have trials to overcome,” he added.
The bells of all cathedrals in France will sound at 6:50 p.m. (1650 GMT) on Wednesday, 48 hours after the fire started.
Images from inside the cathedral showed its immense walls standing proud, with statues still in place and a gleaming golden cross above the altar.
However the floor was covered in charred rubble from the fallen roof and water while parts of the vaulting at the top of the cathedral had collapsed.
Junior interior minister Laurent Nunez told reporters at the scene that work to secure the structure would continue into Thursday, allowing firefighters access to remove remaining artefacts and artworks.
He said the building had been saved within a critical time window of 15-30 minutes by a team of 400 firefighters who worked flat out through the night.
Though “some weaknesses” in the 850-year-old structure had been identified, overall it is “holding up OK,” he added.
Renovation work on the steeple, where workers were replacing its lead covering, is widely suspected to have caused the inferno.
Investigators interviewed witnesses and began speaking with employees of five different construction companies that were working on the monument, said public prosecutor Remy Heitz.
“Nothing indicates this was a deliberate act,” Heitz told reporters, adding that 50 investigators had been assigned to what he expected to be a “long and complex” case.
A public appeal for funds drew immediate support from French billionaires and other private donors as well as from countries including Germany, Italy and Russia which offered expertise.
French billionaire Bernard Arnault and his LVMH luxury conglomerate, rival high-end designer goods group Kering, Total oil company and cosmetics giant L’Oreal each pledged 100 million euros or more.
Support came from outside France as well, with Apple chief Tim Cook announcing the tech giant would give an unspecified amount.
But experts had warned a full restoration will take many years.
“I’d say decades,” said Eric Fischer, head of the foundation in charge of restoring the 1,000-year-old Strasbourg cathedral.
Thousands of Parisians and tourists watched in horror Monday as flames engulfed the building and rescuers tried to save as much as they could of the cathedral’s treasures.
Many more came Tuesday to the banks of the river Seine to gaze at where the roof and steeple once stood.
A firefighter suffered injuries during the blaze, which at one point threatened to bring down one of the two monumental towers on the western facade of the cathedral that is visited by 13 million tourists each year.
The Holy Crown of Thorns, believed to have been worn by Jesus at his crucifixion, was saved by firefighters, as was a sacred tunic worn by 13th-century French king Louis IX.
Rescuers formed a human chain at the site of the disaster to evacuate as many artefacts as possible, which were then stocked temporarily at the Paris town hall.
Macron vows to rebuild a ‘more beautiful’ Notre-Dame in 5 years
Macron vows to rebuild a ‘more beautiful’ Notre-Dame in 5 years
- The blaze on Monday gutted the great Paris landmark, destroying the roof, causing the steeple to collapse and leaving France reeling with shock
- Pledges worth around 700 million euros ($790 million) have already been made from French billionaires and businesses to restore the Gothic masterpiece
Trump urges Iranian Kurds to attack Iran as war widens
- Azerbaijan preparing unspecified retaliatory measures on Thursday
- The seven-day war has now seen Iran target Israel, the Gulf states, Cyprus, Turkiye and Azerbaijan, and spread to the Indian Ocean off Sri Lanka
DUBAI/WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump encouraged Iranian Kurdish forces in Iraq to launch attacks against Iran as the Middle East conflict widened, with Azerbaijan warning it would retaliate for being targeted by Iranian missiles.
Israel on Friday said it had started a “broad-scale” wave of attacks against infrastructure targets in Tehran, as Gulf cities came under renewed bombardment by Iran.
The seven-day war has now seen Iran target Israel, the Gulf states, Cyprus, Turkiye and Azerbaijan, and spread to the Indian Ocean off Sri Lanka where a US submarine sank an Iranian naval ship.
On the possibility of the Iranian Kurdish forces entering Iran, Trump told Reuters on Thursday: “I think it’s wonderful that they want to do that, I’d be all for it.”
Two Iranian drone attacks targeted an Iranian opposition camp in Iraqi Kurdistan on Thursday, security sources said.
Iranian Kurdish militias have consulted with the United States in recent days about whether, and how, to attack Iran’s security forces in the western part of the country, according to three sources with knowledge of the matter.
The Iranian Kurdish coalition of groups based on the Iran-Iraq border in the semi-autonomous region of Iraqi Kurdistan has been training to mount such an attack in hopes of weakening the country’s military, as the United States and Israel pound Iranian targets with bombs and missiles. Trump, speaking with Reuters in a telephone interview, also said the United States must have a role in deciding who will be the next leader of Iran after airstrikes killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei last week.
“We’re going to have to choose that person along with Iran. We’re going to have to choose that person,” he said.
US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Thursday that the US was not expanding its military objectives in Iran, despite what Trump said about choosing the country’s next leader.
“There’s no expansion in our objectives. We know exactly what we’re trying to achieve,” he said. The attack on Iran is a major political gamble for the Republican president, with opinion polls showing little support and Americans concerned about the rise in gasoline prices caused by disruption to energy supplies. Trump dismissed that concern. Shares on Wall Street fell on Thursday, weighed by surging oil prices, as the economic impact of the campaign intensified, with countries around the world cut off from a fifth of global supplies of oil and liquefied natural gas and air transport still facing chaos and global logistics increasingly snarled.
Azerbaijan prepares to retaliate
Azerbaijan was preparing unspecified retaliatory measures on Thursday after it said four Iranian drones crossed its border and injured four people in the Nakhchivan exclave.
“We will not tolerate this unprovoked act of terror and aggression against Azerbaijan,” President Ilham Aliyev told a meeting of his Security Council.
Iran, which has a significant Azeri minority, denied it targeted its neighbor.
Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah militia warned Israeli residents to evacuate towns within 5 km (3 miles) of the border between the countries in a message posted on its Telegram channel in Hebrew early on Friday.
“Your military’s aggression against Lebanese sovereignty and safe citizens, the destruction of civilian infrastructure and the expulsion campaign it is carrying out will not go unchallenged,” Hezbollah said.
Us munitions full
Hegseth and Admiral Brad Cooper, who leads US forces in the Middle East, said during a briefing about operations that the US has enough munitions to continue its bombardment indefinitely.
“Iran is hoping that we cannot sustain this, which is a really bad miscalculation,” Hegseth told reporters at Central Command headquarters in Florida. “Our munitions are full up and our will is ironclad.”
The Pentagon earlier this week said the military campaign, known as Operation Epic Fury, is focused on destroying Iran’s offensive missiles, missile production and navy, while not allowing Tehran to have a nuclear weapon.
Cooper said the US had now hit at least 30 Iranian ships, including a large drone carrier that he said was the size of a World War Two aircraft carrier.
He added that B-2 bombers had in the past few hours dropped dozens of 2,000 penetrator bombs targeting deeply buried ballistic missile launchers, and that bombings were also targeting Iran’s missile production facilities.
Iran’s ballistic missile attacks had decreased by 90 percent since the first day of the war, while drone attacks had decreased by 83 percent in that time frame, he said. In Iran, at least 1,230 people have been killed, according to the Iranian Red Crescent Society, including 175 schoolgirls and staff killed at a primary school in Minab in the country’s south on the first day of the war. Another 77 have been killed in Lebanon, its Health Ministry says. Thousands fled southern Beirut on Thursday after Israel warned residents to leave.
