This Thursday, June 29, a white march was organized in tribute to Nahel, this 17-year-old teenager killed by the shooting of a police officer following a refusal to comply Tuesday in Nanterre, in the Hauts-de-Seine . After a calm walk, the participants watched, dumbfounded, at the tensions that plagued the procession at the end of the afternoon.
While Nanterre and many towns in Île-de-France are under tension, nearly 6,200 people went to this white march organized at the call of the victim’s mother, according to the Paris police headquarters. A few hours before the start of the march, the Nanterre prosecutor’s office announced in the morning the indictment of the policeman suspected of having killed the young Nahel.
While several people went to the initial meeting point in front of the Hauts-de-Seine prefecture, the starting point of the march was changed at the last minute. “I saw on Twitter that the address had changed, but I wonder if many have seen it, worries a resident who went to the white march. There are people who go to the prefecture there“.
The participants in the white march gradually arrive in front of the Fontenelles media library, in Nanterre. • © Kévin Belbéoc’h-Dumarcet / France 3 Paris Ile-de-France
The procession must then leave from the Fontenelles media library, not far from the Pablo Picasso city, where Nahel lived. Around one o’clock, the avenue Pablo Picasso timidly fills up. In front of the media library, foreign journalists set up their equipment.
“We always bring these young people from the neighborhood back to their origins, to the fact that they are scum”
Karima Khatim
municipal councilor in Blanc-Mesnil (Seine-Saint-Denis)
As the start time approaches, the avenue fills up with the arrival of participants. An elected municipal opposition representative in Blanc-Mesnil, in Seine-Saint-Denis, attracts the attention of the first journalists present. “We always bring these young people from the neighborhood back to their origins, to the fact that they are scum” s’exclaim Karima Khatim.
video duration: 00h00mn09s
Ian Brossat, PCF adviser from Paris and Fabien Roussel, national secretary of the PCF arrive at the white march in tribute to Nahel. • ©Kévin Belbéoc’h-Dumarcet / France 3
The crowd, massed in front of the lead truck carrying Nahel’s mother, rushes calmly down the avenue Pablo Picasso. The crowd regularly chants the same slogan: “Police, assassins !“. A beginning of a march that takes place in calm, but not devoid of slogans directed towards the police.”Police murder, justice for Nahel!“, “and everyone hates it police !“.
“We are going to show them that we are not savages, that they have stolen a son, a brother, a friend, a neighbor from us”
A relative of Nahel
on the lead truck
Mediators in flocked red t-shirts”City of Nanterre” try to direct the procession and ensure the smooth running of the march. “We’re going to show them that we’re not savages, that they stole a son, a brother, a friend, a neighbor from us“, proclaims one of Nahel’s relatives on the lead truck wearing a t-shirt “Justice pour Nahel“. On the truck, the mother of young Nahel is accompanied by Assa Traoré, the sister of Adama Traoré, who died following an arrest in 2016.
duration of the video: 00h00mn20s
The procession of the white march for Nahel • ©France 3 PIDF
Upon arrival at the Théâtre des Amandiers, where the procession must branch off onto the departmental road which joins the Hauts-de-Seine prefecture, the crowd thickens. The police are then discreet, traffic is ensured by agents of the city of Nanterre. Several individuals are ahead of the lead truck to head towards Nelson Mandela Square, near the prefecture. An hour has passed, the volunteer “red t-shirts” continue to maintain the crowd and repeat instructions of non-violence.
video duration: 00h00mn10s
The crowd observes a minute of silence in memory of the victim. • ©Kévin Belbéoc’h-Dumarcet / France 3 Paris Ile-de-France
About ten minutes later, the crowd observes a minute of silence in memory of the victim, while some young people along the Departmental Archives continue to chant the slogan “Everybody hates the police“. On the lead truck, Nahel’s mother wants to call for calm.
“We all asked for it to be peaceful, for the mourning. All those of Nanterre remained calm”
Farid
resident and merchant in Nanterre
The white march reached the prefecture in the middle of the afternoon. It is in this same building that the police officer responsible for Nahel’s death is heard.
Many CRS buses grouped together on Boulevard Jacques Germain Soufflot. • © Kévin Belbéoc’h-Dumarcet / France 3 Paris Ile-de-France
The first CRS trucks, lined up on Boulevard Jacques Germain Soufflot, then appeared in the eyes of the participants. Some remain at a distance, where boos are linked.
video duration: 00h00mn23s
A strip of grass caught fire near a Vélib station. • ©Kévin Belbéoc’h-Dumarcet / France 3 Paris Ile-de-France
On the Nelson Mandela square, the tension goes up a notch. While individuals try to climb the gates of the prefecture, the procession splits in two. A part joined the place where Nahel’s car crashed, a few tens of meters away.
Tear gas begins to invade the streets and disperses demonstrators and participants. While mortar fire and fireworks are heard, a fire starts in a fallow area near a Vélib bicycle station.
“I am a trader next door, we must protect our businesses”
Farid
resident and merchant in Nanterre
“We would have preferred a silent march out of respect for the family. We all asked for it to be peaceful, for mourning. All those of Nanterre remained calm“, says Farid, 50, who lives in Nanterre. “All these young people do not come from here, they are from other suburbs. They don’t know the family“, he advances. “I am a merchant next door, we must protect our businesses“. The dispersed white march, tensions with the police take over the streets of Nanterre.
Thick black smoke caused by a car fire, boulevard des Bouvets. • © Kévin Belbéoc’h-Dumarcet
Several fire starts there, especially in the entrance of a building on the square where the firefighters manage to intervene quickly. A few meters away, the firefighters are not idle: no less than six cars are set on fire in the boulevards of Bouvets. Thick black smoke hits the street.
Intervention of the firefighters, boulevard des Bouvets. • © Kévin Belbéoc’h-Dumarcet
At the end of the afternoon, the tensions move punctually between the Charles de Gaulle esplanade and the André Malraux park, with, on the spot, firing of firecrackers and the use of tear gas. The research and intervention brigade (BRI), a unit dedicated to difficult interventions, is deployed there according to a police source at AFP.
Members of the police present in Nanterre, following the white march. • © Kévin Belbéoc’h-Dumarcet / France 3
Immediately in a press release, the prefect of Hauts-de-Seine Laurent Hottiaux “condemns the violence“which took place on the sidelines of the white march, and”call for calm“. “If at first, the wandering took place in calm, (…) the police were then taken to task by isolated and violent elements” he said. Nearly 5,000 police and gendarmes were mobilized this Thursday evening in Île-de-France, that is “four times as muchs” than the personnel deployed overnight from Wednesday to Thursday according to the Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin.
#Death #Nahel #Nanterre #preferred #silent #white #march #respect #family
