3 Years After the Charlie Hebdo Terror Attacks, the Satirical Magazine Struggles with £1.3m Security Bill

Charlie Hebdo is struggling with an annual security bill of ?1.5 million (£1.32m) as President Emmanuel Macron leads commemorations on the third anniversary of the terror attack on the satirical weekly on Sunday, Sunday Telegraph writes. 

Sales have slumped after surging to an unprecedented 7 million copies following the attack on 7 January 2015.

Saïd and Chérif Kouachi murdered 12 people including five cartoonists and journalists, all household names in France. 

The attack triggered a wave of international solidarity.

Many people defended Charlie Hebdo's characteristically provocative, irreverent cartoons, which often lampoon the Prophet Mohammed. 

Public support for the weekly has since fallen after its cartoons caused offence by poking fun at earthquake and terror victims.

Sales of the niche newspaper have tumbled back to about 30,000, close to pre-attack levels. But death threats continue to flood in on social media, forcing the newspaper to install security systems and hire bodyguards in addition to police protection.

In its latest issue, under the headline "Three years in a tin can," Laurent Sourisseau, the director of the publication and its main shareholder, complained that Charlie has been left to fend for itself. 

"Is it normal for a newspaper in a democratic country that one out of every two copies sold goes on paying for the security of its offices?", wrote Riss, as he is known.

The attack and others that killed a policewoman and four Jews the same week horrified the nation.

Nearly four million people marched through Paris days later under the banner "Je Suis Charlie", and David Cameron and other world leaders joined the march and the slogan...