Organized demonstrations as part of France’s two-month-long mobilization of protest against pension reform have been overshadowed by unrest, which has been accompanied by violent police action in recent days, several human rights organizations say.
The Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council of Europe, Dunja Mijatović, made the same accusation.
“Sporadic acts of violence by some demonstrators, or other reprehensible acts committed by others during a demonstration, do not justify the excessive use of force by state agents. These actions are also not enough to deprive peaceful demonstrators of freedom of assembly,” she said. said.
On the contrary, the NGOs have chosen a harsher tone.
Human Rights League President Patrick Baudouin commented: “The totalitarian drift of the French state, violence in relations by the police, acts of violence of all kinds and impunity is a high-profile scandal.”
The association accused the authorities of violating “the right of citizens to protest through disproportionate and dangerous use of force.”
Human Rights Watch criticized “arbitrary crowd control and riot control tactics.”
And French interior minister Gérald Darmanan said police were content with acting to counter the “extremist turn” taken by “far-left vandals” who infiltrate demonstrators to provoke riots.
Agence France-Presse correspondents saw many masked youths setting fire to dumpsters, smashing shop windows and throwing stones or fireworks at the security forces.
Authorities said about 1,500 “terrorists” who are members of the so-called “Black Bloc,” an extremist terrorist group, infiltrated a protest march in Paris on Thursday. And 441 policemen and gendarmes were injured during Thursday’s demonstrations across France.
The Minister indicated that 11 criminal cases had been initiated against police officers. He explained: “They may be police or gendarmerie officers who often feel exhausted and do things on an individual level that may be contrary to what they have learned”, highlighting at the same time the “fantastic” work of the security service. makes “avoid all death”.
More than 450 people were arrested on the day of the most violent demonstrations since the beginning of the protest movement against the reform of the pension system, which raises the retirement age from 62 to 64 years.
As the bill was passed in Parliament last week without a vote, videos of French police pushing or beating demonstrators have circulated on social media.
serious injury
“It appears that the French authorities have not learned their lessons and reviewed their riot control policies and practices,” said Benedict Jeanro, director of Human Rights Watch France, after the 2018-2019 yellow vest demonstrations, which he compares to current move.
According to a source familiar with the case, the Paris prosecutor’s office opened at least three investigations on suspicion of violence by a person with official powers in recent times.
One of these investigations was launched on March 14 after the mother of a 15-year-old high school student named Fanny filed a complaint after she was hit in the forehead by a shrapnel, likely as a result of police throwing a grenade into dispersing demonstrators.
According to a complaint seen by Agence France-Presse, two policemen beat her with a truncheon while she was lying on the ground.
Another complaint concerns a policeman punching a demonstrator in the face on Monday night in Paris and was filmed widely on the Internet.
Human rights organizations report that police may have injured the man, forcing doctors to amputate one of his testicles.
Paris police chief Laurent Nunez said this week that security forces only intervene when groups form “with the intent to commit acts of violence.”
