Paris authorities find body of man in Saint‑Martin canal

Early Saturday morning firefighters and the river brigade recovered the body of a man in his thirties from the Saint‑Martin canal near Quai de Valmy. The body was swollen, indicating it had been in the water for several days, and the man carried no identification.

The canal was opened to public swimming in mid‑June as a response to a recent heatwave, but swimming is now permitted only on Sundays. The area has already seen a drowning on 26 June and injuries to about fifty youths who jumped from bridges, actions that are prohibited. In response, the city of Paris launched a new season of supervised swimming on the Seine, offering three free, monitored sites at Bercy, Grenelle near the Eiffel Tower, and the Marie arm in central Paris. National sports minister Marina Ferrari reported that more than 90 drowning deaths have occurred in France since 19 June, describing the figure as “concerning.”