Olympic chiefs hope a world divided by coronavirus and conflict can be united by cardboard and condoms.
In the city of love – with pandemic-era Olympic restrictions over – Paris 2024 is encouraging amour among athletes again.
After the keys were handed over, Sky News joined Games chiefs on inspections of the Olympic Village that will welcome 9,000 athletes in July.
In the accommodation we were shown the surprising bed frame – cardboard. Sturdy enough, apparently, to support 250kg of Olympian – or Olympians.
And we were told 300,000 condoms will be available in the Olympic Village – enough for almost two each for every day of the Games.
Mixing among nations is very much encouraged again with the creation of a Village Club, after social distancing orders at the last summer Games in Tokyo in 2021 and an intimacy ban from the International Olympic Committee.
“It is very important that the conviviality here is something big,” Laurent Michaud, director of the village, told Sky News.
“Working with the athletes commission, we wanted to create some places where the athletes would feel very enthusiastic and comfortable.”
But while a French staple is off the menu in the village there will be plenty to ensure athletes are well-nourished and refreshed.
Advertisement
“No champagne in the village, of course, but they can have all the champagne they want also in Paris,” said Mr Michaud, who previously ran Center Parcs in France.
“We will have more than 350 metres of buffet with the world food… and I’m sure that the athletes will be very happy to have some French specialties made over here.
“But the variety will first respond to the athletes’ needs for their nutrition and their performance.”
The Olympic Village is the single costliest Olympic project at €2bn (£1.7bn) but largely funded by property investors.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
0:59
Inside the Paris Olympic village
Around €650m of public funds have also been used for the project that regenerates this deprived area of Saint-Denis near the Stade de France.
The size of 70 football pitches, the village is split by the River Seine with a bridge to link the accommodation blocks.
For the IOC it is about avoiding white elephant projects of the past – ensuring host cities are not left with vast infrastructure built for the Olympics that has little lasting legacy.
“It’s about a responsible Games delivering less complex Games, which means less costly Games, and that’s very important because we have to be cost conscious in today’s world,” IOC member Pierre-Olivier Beckers-Vieujant, the Paris 2024 Olympic coordination commission chair, told Sky News.
“It’s a project where 95% of the venues would be either existing or temporary. So in itself, Paris had to build a very limited number of venues and or infrastructure, all of them being needed by the region, like the various infrastructure of the village here.”
There are little signs yet across Paris the Games are coming – the most visible indicators are the additional CCTV cameras being installed.
Changes to the law were required to allow AI video surveillance to be used to identify potential threats with the security concerns heightened amid the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza and Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine.
But organisers are still determined to take events into the heart of Paris.
The opening ceremony will be staged down the River Seine with the athletes parading on a flotilla of boats, although the terror threat has curtailed ticket availability from viewing positions.
Urban sports will be at Place de la Concorde at the end of the Champs-Elysees, including the debut of breaking, BMX freestyle and skateboarding.
And the city’s most iconic venue – the Eiffel Tower – will be a stunning setting for beach volleyball.
Olympic Games executive director Christophe Dubi told Sky News: “This incredible city backdrop comes with the challenge of having this concentration of people over what is in the end a pretty small footprint.”
But it is a welcome challenge after spectators were banned from Tokyo’s venues in 2021 due to the pandemic and Rio 2016 struggled to attract large capacities.
The crowds should be back in force for the first time since London 2012 and the most tickets outside of France have been sold to fans in Britain.
“It has to be a celebration and it is a celebration – we’ve had many challenges in the past,” Mr Dubi said.
“In Rio we faced situations that were amazingly complex. But what you see is that with a bit of goodwill from everyone – starting with the organisers, but also as far as the Olympic community is concerned – meeting with the challenges and coming up with solutions… is in the greater interest that the Games represent.
“What we all want is for unity, peace and a celebration of the best athletes. This is how this creative family works together.
There are mechanisms to protect the regime in events like this and the Revolutionary Guard, which was founded in 1979 precisely for that purpose, will be a major player in what comes next.
In the immediate term, vice-president Mohammed Mokhber will assume control and elections will be held within 50 days.
Mokhber isn’t as close to the supreme leader as Raisi was, and won’t enjoy his standing, but he has run much of Khamenei’s finances for years and is credited with helping Iran evade some of the many sanctions levied on it.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
1:12
Drone footage of helicopter crash site
Raisi’s successor will most likely be the chosen candidate of the supreme leader and certainly another ultra-conservative hardliner – a shift back to the moderates is highly unlikely.
Likewise, we shouldn’t expect any significant change in Iran’s foreign activities or involvement with the war in Gaza. It will be business as usual, as much as possible.
However, after years of anti-government demonstrations following the death of Mahsa Amini in 2022, this might be a moment for the protest movement to rise up and take to the streets again.
Iranian protesters have expressed “joy” over the death of President Ebrahim Raisi who was dubbed the “Butcher of Tehran”.
Speaking to Sky News’ The World With Yalda Hakim, three Iranians spoke on the condition of anonymity over fears of being tracked down by the country’s regime.
A protest leader – who is currently in hiding – suggested Sunday’s crash, that also killed Iran’s foreign minister, was “pre-planned”.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
0:36
Rescuers reach helicopter crash site
“We may not be across everything, but it’s been a known fact for a long time that Raisi was a serious contender to replace the Supreme Leader Khamenei, and perhaps some didn’t want that to happen.
“But all in all, this was very good news.
“All I can say is that the only thing that has made me truly happy over the past five years has been the news of Raisi’s death.”
Mr Raisi’s time in charge included major protests over Mahsa Amini – the woman who died after she was arrested for allegedly not wearing her hijab properly.
The US said Mr Raisi had “blood on his hands” as the former hardline cleric was “a brutal participant in the repression of the Iranian people for nearly four decades”.
From the voices speaking out on The World with Yalda Hakim from inside Iran there was a sense of celebration on the eve of the funeral of their dead president but also a sense of realism.
One dead president the fall of a regime does not make. That is the bitter truth for those brave Iranians speaking out and the millions of Iranians they represent. They detest a man who presided over a brutal crackdown on protests that saw hundreds killed on the streets, and thousands incarcerated, tortured, raped or killed after their arbitrary arrest.
But there are reasons for Iranians to find some hope in the news of the president’s death.
Analysts have compared the Iranian theocratic Islamic regime to the Soviet Union in its dying days.
It is ideologically bankrupt. Its people do not believe in what it stands for anymore. It is morally bankrupt too, after the brutal repression that crushed the Women, Life and Freedom protests. But it remains powerful, with many people on its payroll and it is hard to predict how or when it falls.
Iran’s people want one thing though, and its government the opposite, and that ultimately is impossible to sustain.
Raisi had a unique skill set. He was both a zealous idealogue and an ex-judge. A man who understood how both Iran’s judiciary and presidency works. He combined a passionate belief in the Iranian revolution with an expertise in how its regime operated.
It has been said many times in the last 24 hours that Ayatollah Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, will find another hardliner to replace him. There are plenty more where he came from.
But no one with quite his skills and expertise. That may not be important immediately but at the moment of greatest danger in the not so distant future when Khamenei dies, it could make all the difference.
With no anointed successor, the supreme leader’s passing could usher in a period of instability and weakness for the regime. Raisi was seen as a potential successor but also a powerful stabilising force as president in that perilous hiatus, someone who could hold the ring while the new order is established and power struggles fought out.
Raisi’s death may well not mean immediate change for Iran but it could ultimately hasten its end.
A housewife, who was beaten up for taking parting in the “Woman, Life, Protest” movements, said: “The public hatred towards this regime is not a secret to anyone.
“Raisi’s death proved that the pain that this inflicted on our people will one day hit them back.
“My personal reaction to the death of Raisi… I was very happy.
“I’m not upset at all. Even though I never wish death on anyone, but this man, not only did he not do anything for our nation, but he ordered the death of countless young innocent people.”
Following news of Mr Raisi’s death, US State department spokesperson Matt Miller said the Iranian president “was involved in numerous horrific human rights abuses, including playing a key role in the extra judicial killing of thousands of political prisoners in 1988”.
“Some of the worst human rights abuses occurred during his tenure as president, especially the human rights abuses against the women and girls of Iran,” he added.
The US approach to Iran “will not change” because of Mr Raisi’s death, Mr Miller said.
Joe Biden has said ‘what is happening in Gaza is not genocide’ following an arrest warrant request by the International Criminal Court prosecutor for Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The US president branded the warrant request as “outrageous,” adding “whatever this prosecutor might imply, there is no equivalence – none – between Israel and Hamas.”
“What’s happening in Gaza is not genocide. We reject that,” Mr Biden said at a Jewish American Heritage Month event at the White House.
He said American support for the safety and security of Israelis is “ironclad”.
International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor Karim Khan KC has applied for arrest warrants to be issued for Israel’s prime minister and Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar over alleged war crimes.
He is also seeking arrest warrants for Israeli defence minister Yoav Gallant – and other top Hamas leaders Mohammed Diab Ibrahim al Masri, more commonly known as Deif (commander-in-chief of the military wing of Hamas, known as the al Qassam Brigades), and Ismail Haniyeh (head of Hamas’s political bureau).
Mr Netanyahu said: “As prime minister of Israel, I reject with disgust the Hague prosecutor’s comparison between democratic Israel and the mass murderers of Hamas.
More from World
“With what audacity do you compare Hamas that murdered, burned, butchered, decapitated, raped and kidnapped our brothers and sisters and the IDF soldiers fighting a just war.
“No pressure and no decision in any international forum will prevent us from striking those who seek to destroy us.”
Advertisement
In a statement, Mr Khan outlined the reasons his office was applying for the arrest warrants.
“Now, more than ever, we must collectively demonstrate that international humanitarian law, the foundational baseline for human conduct during conflict, applies to all individuals and applies equally across the situations addressed by my office and the court,” he said.
“This is how we will prove, tangibly, that the lives of all human beings have equal value.”
On the Hamas leaders, he said he has reasonable grounds to believe they “bear criminal responsibility” for “war crimes and crimes against humanity”.
He outlined a list of alleged crimes, including murder, taking hostages and rape and other acts of sexual violence.
“We submit that the crimes against humanity charged were part of a widespread and systematic attack against the civilian population of Israel by Hamas and other armed groups pursuant to organisational policies. Some of these crimes, in our assessment, continue to this day,” he said.
On Mr Netanyahu and his defence minister Mr Gallant, Mr Khan said he has reasonable grounds to believe they too “bear criminal responsibility” for “war crimes and crimes against humanity”.
He outlined a list of alleged crimes, including “starvation of civilians” and “intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population”.
“We submit that the crimes against humanity charged were committed as part of a widespread and systematic attack against the Palestinian civilian population pursuant to state policy. These crimes, in our assessment, continue to this day,” he said.
Follow Sky News on WhatsApp
Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News
Benny Gantz, a former military chief and member of Israel’s war cabinet, harshly criticised Mr Khan’s announcement, saying Israel fights with “one of the strictest” moral codes and has a robust judiciary capable of investigating itself.
South Africa, which has been leading a genocide case against Israel, welcomed the news Mr Khan was seeking the arrest of Israeli and Hamas leaders.
“The law must be applied equally to all in order to uphold the international rule of law,” the office of South African president Cyril Ramaphosa said.