Thousands march in France to protest against police violence

Tens of thousands of protesters marched throughout France Saturday in rallies planned by the left to protest police violence, with fights breaking out on the outskirts of the Paris event.

The countrywide demonstration comes just under three months after a police officer’s point-blank execution of a minor at a traffic stop prompted more than a week of riots in Paris and elsewhere.

Demonstrators of different ages marched across the capital, holding signs that said, “Stop state violence,” “Don’t forgive or forget,” or “The law kills.”

Demonstrators targeted article 435-1 of the Internal Security Code, which was established in 2017 and gives officials more licence to fire if a suspect refuses to cooperate.

They were responding to a call by the radical left including the hard-left France Unbowed (LFI).

Unions said some 80,000 people joined the protests across France, including 15,000 in Paris, but the interior ministry put the number at 31,300 nationwide, with 9,000 in Paris.

‘Unacceptable violence’

The government denounced “unacceptable violence” on the margins of the march in Paris after officers were trapped in their police vehicle when it was attacked, an AFP correspondent said.

Hundreds of hooded people wearing black broke away from the main march of several thousand people in Paris.

They smashed the windows of a bank branch and threw objects at a police car stuck in traffic, an AFP reporter said.

Paris police said the car was attacked with a crowbar and that anti-riot officers were forced to intervene.

Police said three officers were slightly injured.

A video later published by the BFMTV channel and shared on the internet showed a group of masked protesters running after the car, repeatedly kicking it, as one man smashes a window with a crowbar.

An officer gets out and brandishes his service weapon, but does not fire it and gets back in the vehicle.

“We see where anti-police hatred leads,” Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin wrote on X, formerly Twitter, denouncing “unacceptable violence” against the police.

La « manifestation » parisienne a connu des violences inacceptables contre les forces de l’ordre. On voit où mène la haine anti police. https://t.co/X63bj0bhcH

— Gérald DARMANIN (@GDarmanin) September 23, 2023

Paris police chief Laurent Nunez said three people had been arrested over the incident.

In total, six people were arrested throughout France, according to a report by the Ministry of the Interior.

'Injustice destroys families'

Among those marching in the northern city of Lille was 27-year-old Mohamed Leknoun, whose brother Amine was killed in August 2022 after refusing to obey police orders.

"All this injustice destroys families," he told AFP.

He deplored the fact that he had not been informed of any progress in the investigation since the police officer who fired the fatal shot was indicted.

The march came days after the IGPN, the inspectorate responsible for investigating police misconduct, released its annual report on the use of force by officers.

It showed that in 2022, 38 people died as a result of police action, including 22 who were shot dead. Thirteen of those deaths involved cases of someone refusing to comply with a police order.

In July, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination -- made up of 18 independent experts -- flagged concerns about the "excessive use of force by law enforcement" in France.

It also called for the government to "adopt legislation that defines and prohibits racial profiling".