Three months after the riots, tension is still palpable between demonstrators and the police. This Saturday, during a rally against police violence in Paris, clashes broke out between police officers in a vehicle and demonstrators, injuring, according to the prefecture, several officers, and pushing one between them to take out his weapon.
“The Parisian demonstration experienced unacceptable violence against the police. We see where anti-police hatred leads,” responded the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, on. The union of internal security executives (SCSI), representing police officers and commissioners, castigated the “terrible images of police officers attacked in Paris by a horde of unleashed savages. This is the result of the anti-cop hatred of the organizers of the September 23 March. They are responsible for this violence.”
Three police officers injured
The incident, which occurred on Boulevard de Clichy, in the north of the capital, was photographed and filmed by several journalists on site, including that of Le Parisien. In certain images, broadcast on social networks this Saturday in the middle of the afternoon, we see a police car, blocked on the road, targeted by several demonstrators “in faces and carrying iron bars”, describes the police headquarters at the Parisian.
These demonstrators, gathered in groups of dozens, kick and throw projectiles at the vehicle, whose flashing lights and alarm have been activated – but which does not seem to be able to move forward. Three police officers were slightly injured during the incident, including two suffering from neck trauma, Paris prefect Laurent Nuñez said on BFMTV.
VIDEO. Targeted by projectiles, a police officer aims his weapon at demonstrators
Quickly, one of the police officers on board gets out of the car shouting “Move!” Move! », a weapon held firmly at arm’s length. At the sight of the agent, the projectile throwers move away. This gesture was an “administrative weapon outing”, Laurent Nuñez later commented. The police car, which was to manage a security operation due to the Rugby World Cup, according to prefect Laurent Nuñez, then attempted a first departure, failing to injure the police officer who was not yet fully seated in the vehicle. .
Weakened by traffic, the police officers remained stuck in their car for at least a minute, which was once again targeted by several projectiles and blows from certain demonstrators. A “BRAV intervention”, named after this controversial unit of motorcycle police officers, “made it possible to stop the action and shelter” the police officers present in the vehicle, the police headquarters said. Three people were arrested. “We will work to try to confuse the perpetrators of this attack,” assured Laurent Nuñez on BFMTV.
9000 demonstrators in Paris
According to the organizers, 15,000 people participated in the Paris demonstration. 9,000 participants were counted on the side of the authorities in Paris. 31,300 people were counted throughout France.
In Paris, a bank located at the Anvers metro station, not far away, was also damaged by the same individuals dressed in black and hooded. The demonstrators, of all ages, brandished signs reading “Stop state violence”, “Neither forget nor forgive”, or even “Racist state, police state”. The death three months ago of this 17-year-old teenager, killed by a police officer during a road check in Nanterre, triggered a wave of riots throughout the country.
Among the approximately 198 organizations which called for demonstrations were numerous committees against police violence, unions and political organizations including EELV and France Insoumise, represented in particular by the president of the LFI group at the Assembly Mathilde Panot. At the start of the procession, she defended herself against any animosity towards the police. “This march is certainly not what Gérald Darmanin says, that is to say an anti-police march but a march to defend the Republic,” she assured, once again criticizing the so-called Cazeneuve law of 2017 which expanded the possibility for law enforcement officers to fire their weapons in the event of refusal to comply and calling in particular for reinforced training for police officers.
2023-09-24 03:16:11
#Paris #targeted #projectiles #police #officer #aims #weapon #demonstrators
