Thousands of critics of a proposed security law that would restrict sharing images of police officers in France gathered across the country in protest Saturday, with the country shaken by footage showing officers beating and racially abusing a Black man, reports FRANCE 24.
Some 133,000 people took to the streets – including 46,000 in Paris – according to the government's figures. Demonstrators in the French capital carried red union flags, the national tricolour flag and homemade signs denouncing police violence, demanding media freedom or calling for interior minister Gérald Darmanin’s resignation. Bordeaux, Lille, Strasbourg, Montpellier, Nantes and other French cities also saw protests.
Police fired tear gas in Paris after demonstrators launched fireworks at them, put up barricades and threw stones. "Thirty-seven police officers and gendarmes were injured during the demonstrations, according to provisional figures. I once again condemn the unacceptable violence against the security forces," Darmanin wrote on Twitter.
The crowd included journalists, journalism students, leftwing activists and citizens of varied political stripes expressing anger over what they perceive as a hardening police tactics in recent years, especially since France's Yellow Vest protests against economic hardship in 2018.
“There were all those protests in the summer against police violence, and this law shows the government didn’t hear us... It’s the impunity. That’s what makes us so angry," protest participant Kenza Berkane, 26, told AP.
French President Emmanuel Macron on Friday said images of police beating a Black music producer in Paris put “shame” on the country, with top politicians and sportsmen expressing outrage over the incident.
The case, coming on the heels of a violent evacuation of migrants in central Paris, has shocked the nation and galvanised opponents of the government's controversial new security law.
One of the most disputed elements of the proposed law is Article 24, which would criminalise the publication of images of on-duty police officers [if these are deemed to harm] their "physical or psychological integrity".
It was passed by the National Assembly last week – although it is awaiting Senate approval – provoking protests and drawing condemnation from media organisations across France.
“The bill will not jeopardise in any way the rights of journalists or ordinary citizens to inform the public,” Alice Thourot, an MP for Macron’s La République En Marche (LREM) party and the co-author of the clause, told French daily Le Figaro last week. Article 24 would “outlaw any calls for violence or reprisals against police officers on social media – and that only”, Thourot said.
However, NGOs and journalists’ groups are calling for the article to be withdrawn, claiming that it contradicts "the fundamental public freedoms of our Republic".