France on High Alert After Tips About Terrorist Attacks

(Sept. 20) -- France was on high alert today after threats of a possible terrorist attack by al-Qaida's North African branch and reports that a female suicide bomber had planned to strike somewhere in Paris.

French radio station RTL reported today that France's intelligence service was tipped off Wednesday night that a female suicide bomber planned to blow herself up in Paris last week. Despite a daylong search, however, investigators came up empty.

Le Monde also reported today that French officials received information last week that al-Qaida in North Africa had an increasingly "anti-French focus."

Senior government officials and controversial figures such as Dalil Boubakeur were being protected by armed guards, French media reported. Boubakeur is a well-known moderate Islamic rector of the Grande Mosque of Paris who's been threatened by extremists. Police monitored key hubs in the city like the Eiffel Tower and the Eurostar station.

French Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux told reporters today that the country is in danger. The country's so-called "Vigipirate" terror alert is at red, one level below the highest, scarlet.

"The terrorist threat is real, and today our vigilance, therefore, is reinforced," Hortefeux said.

But the possible suicide bomber may "not necessarily be the most worrying thing," a source in the Interior Ministry told Agence France-Presse.

The source told AFP that the government fears a general attack on the transport system. In addition, French intelligence has learned that two Islamic sleeper cells in France have been recently revived with the return of some Islamic extremists from Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The tense atmosphere in Paris began Tuesday after the French Senate voted overwhelmingly to ban full-face veils. Thursday, five French nationals were kidnapped in Niger.

The night before, the French government was tipped off to the suicide bomber and learned from Algerian intelligence that al-Qaida's North African faction might be planning an "imminent" attack, Le Monde reported.

Called al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, or AQIM, the organization has claimed responsibility for executing a 78-year-old French aid worker in July and kidnapping three Spanish nationals for whose return last month Spain reportedly spent millions.

AQIM is known for an anti-France focus in particular, though. Its members wrote on an extremist website earlier this year: "We will seek dreadful revenge on France by all means at our disposal, for the honor of our daughters and sisters."

More than a week ago, the head of France's domestic intelligence agency, Bernard Squarcini, said France "had never faced a greater terrorist threat."

"France's role in Afghanistan, its foreign policy and the debate over the law banning the burqa have all increased the risk," Squarcini said. "The risk of a terrorist attack on French soil has never been higher and, objectively, there are reasons for worry."

France has not been under this type of terror alert since 1995 when eight people were killed and 80 wounded in a terrorist attack at the Saint-Michel metro station in Paris. Algeria's Armed Islamic Group, a precursor to AQIM, was blamed for the attack.

Some French political opposition leaders have suggested the flurry of terror warnings could be to distract from controversies like a finance scandal and French President Nicolas Sarkozy's controversial deportation of some Roma families, Reuters reported.

"I hope there is not an ounce of manipulation in this," said Francois Bayrou, who was a centrist candidate for president in 2007.