Terrorist incidents map of France 1970-2015

This is a list of

terrorist Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of criminal violence to provoke a state of terror or fear, mostly with the intention to achieve political or religious aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violen ...

attacks in

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

from 1800 to the present. Several 19th-century French rulers were targeted in unsuccessful assassination attempts which killed innocent bystanders. Since December 1973, terrorist attacks have been taking place regularly over the country, with more than 400 people killed and over 1,700 others injured.

Background

France has a lengthy history of terrorist attacks carried out by a variety of groups from the extreme right, extreme left, extreme

Basque Basque may refer to: * Basques, an ethnic group of Spain and France * Basque language, their language Places * Basque Country (greater region), the homeland of the Basque people with parts in both Spain and France * Basque Country (autonomous co ...

, Breton and Corsican nationalists, Algerian insurgent groups and

Islamist extremist Islamic extremism, Islamist extremism, or radical Islam, is used in reference to Extremism, extremist beliefs and behaviors which are associated with the Islam, Islamic religion. These are controversial terms with varying definitions, ranging ...

s. Most of the attacks have been bombings utilising

improvised explosive device An improvised explosive device (IED) is a bomb constructed and deployed in ways other than in conventional military action. It may be constructed of conventional military explosives, such as an artillery shell, attached to a detonating mecha ...

s (IEDs). Anarchists carried out a series of bombings and assassination attempts in the 19th century. A number of attacks associated with the Algerian War took place in the 1950s and 1960s, including the deadliest terrorist attack in France in the 20th century, the 1961 Vitry-Le-François train bombing carried out by the pro-colonialist French nationalist

Organisation armée secrète The ''Organisation Armée Secrète'' (OAS, "Secret Armed Organisation") was a far-right French dissident paramilitary organisation during the Algerian War. The OAS carried out terrorist attacks, including bombings and assassinations, in an atte ...

. Various Middle Eastern factions carried out shootings and bombings in the 1970s and 1980s, mainly in Paris, while during the Algerian Civil War of the 1990s, insurgents associated with the

Armed Islamic Group The Armed Islamic Group (GIA, from french: Groupe Islamique Armé; ar, الجماعة الإسلامية المسلّحة, al-Jamāʿa l-ʾIslāmiyya l-Musallaḥa) was one of the two main Islamist insurgent groups that fought the Algerian gove ...

(GIA) carried out a series of major attacks against the

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

public transport system. Nationalist extremists from the Basque, Breton and Corsican communities carried out a number of assassinations and targeted bomb attacks in the 1990s and 2000s. Islamist extremists have carried out numerous attacks in the 2010s, of which the November 2015 Paris attacks have been the bloodiest to date. Although 2015 has been the deadliest year so far in terms of fatalities caused by terrorist attacks, the number of separate terrorist attacks in previous years has been far higher. The highest number of attacks recorded in a single year was 270 in 1996, largely carried out by Algerian Civil War insurgents. The last year without any recorded terrorist attacks was 1971.

List of incidents

Outside France, the terrorist attack with the most French victims was the 19 September 1989 bombing of

UTA Flight 772 UTA Flight 772 was a scheduled international passenger flight of the French airline Union de Transports Aériens (UTA) operating from Brazzaville in the People's Republic of the Congo, via N'Djamena in Chad, to Charles de Gaulle Airport in Pari ...

over

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History

19th century

20th century

21st century

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:List of terrorist incidents in France

Terrorist incidents The following is a list of terrorist incidents that have not been carried out by a state or its forces (see state terrorism and state-sponsored terrorism). Assassinations are listed at List of assassinated people. Definitions of terroris ...

terrorist incidents The following is a list of terrorist incidents that have not been carried out by a state or its forces (see state terrorism and state-sponsored terrorism). Assassinations are listed at List of assassinated people. Definitions of terroris ...