Marches took place on Saturday September 23 in different cities in France to demonstrate “against systemic racism, police violence and for public freedoms”, at the call of the far left and various organizations, under close surveillance by the forces of order, who expected around 30,000 demonstrators.
In Paris, the procession bringing together several thousand people set off around 3 p.m. from the Gare du Nord, in the northeast of the capital, noted a journalist from Agence France-Presse (AFP). At the front of the demonstration, many family groups are demanding the truth for “Othmane”, “Alassane”, or “Mahamadou”, behind the banner “National coordination against police violence”.
Incidents punctuated the start of the march. Shortly after his departure, a pre-procession of hundreds of individuals dressed in black and hooded was formed in front of the organizations and collectives who had called for mobilization. Arriving at the Anvers metro station, in the north of the capital, they damaged a Caisse d'Epargne bank branch, noted the AFP journalist.
They then threw projectiles at a police car stuck in traffic on Boulevard de Clichy. The car was attacked “with an iron bar,” said the Paris Police Prefecture. One of the police officers then briefly got out of the vehicle with his weapon in hand to keep the demonstrators at bay, according to several videos posted on social networks, confirmed by a police source.
An “intervention by the BRAV”, named after this controversial unit of police officers on motorcycles, “made it possible to stop the action and shelter” the police officers present in the vehicle, said the police headquarters, which did not reported no arrests at this stage. “I strongly condemn these attacks and provide my support to the attacked and injured police officers,” the police prefect, Laurent Nuñez, reacted on X (formerly Twitter). For his part, the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, denounced “unacceptable violence” against the police. “We see where anti-police hatred leads,” he said, on the same network.
Before the departure of the procession, the crowd gathered on Boulevard Magenta chanted “Police everywhere, justice nowhere”, “No justice, no peace” and “Justice for Nahel”. The death three months ago of the 17-year-old teenager, killed by a police officer during a road check in Nanterre, triggered a wave of riots throughout the country. “The law kills”, also denounces a sign, with a statue representing justice with eyes crossed out in red, criticizing article 435-1 of the internal security code, which expands the possibility for the police to fire in the event of refusal to comply.
Up to 135 mobile force units
Several elected officials from La France insoumise (LFI) were present, like MP Mathilde Panot, who praised the “unity” of “198 organizations [which] are calling for this march” – trade union organizations, politicians and other collectives working-class neighborhoods. This demonstration “is certainly not what Mr. Darmanin says, that is to say an anti-police march, but a march in defense of the Republic,” she added. According to the organizers, 15,000 people participated in the Paris demonstration. The police have not yet communicated their estimate.
Gérald Darmanin sent a letter of support to the police and gendarmes on Friday and sent a telegram to the prefects, of which AFP had a copy, calling on them to "show particular vigilance regarding these gatherings", to issue an order ban if necessary and to report messages "carrying insulting and outrageous slogans against the institutions of the Republic, the police and the gendarmerie likely to fall within the scope of the law". On Friday, the Vienne prefecture seized the Poitiers prosecutor for “public insult” for a poster announcing a demonstration against police violence which associated a swastika with the logo of the national police.
The Ministry of the Interior mobilized for this day – also marked by the presence of Pope Francis in Marseille, which follows a three-day state visit by King Charles III and Queen Camilla – between 130 and 135 force units mobile, i.e. a total of 30,000 police and gendarmes. In Paris, “a little more than 1,000 police officers will be mobilized,” said the Paris police prefect, Laurent Nuñez, on Saturday morning on Franceinfo. The Techno Parade also takes place on Saturday; the parade will take place from Place Denfert-Rochereau, left bank, to Place de la Nation. In 2022, there were 250,000 who celebrated in the streets of the capital, according to the organizers.
600 participants in Toulouse, 220 in Saint-Etienne
In other cities, it was from the end of the morning that the demonstrators took to the streets, as in Perpignan, where the organizers' slogan "against systemic racism, police violence and for public freedoms" was gathered around 150 people, according to an AFP correspondent, or in Toulouse, where the procession had some 600 participants, according to the prefecture.
“For public freedoms”, “Down with the police state”, “I love the police who protect and not at all those who beat up”, could we read on signs in Saint-Etienne, where around 220 people demonstrated , according to police. After a parade starting from a working-class neighborhood, two mothers from the Saint-Etienne region, one of whose sons died in police custody, the other in detention, demanded "justice for Mohamed", “justice for Medhi.” In many other cities, a few dozen to a few hundred people gathered around the same slogans.
Risks of disturbances to public order had been mentioned in Gap (Hautes-Alpes), in Rennes (Ille-et-Vilaine), in Lille (North), in Dijon (Côte-d'Or), in Vandoeuvre-lès -Nancy (Meurthe-et-Moselle), in Angers (Maine-et-Loire), in Caen (Calvados), in Angoulême (Charente), in Tulle (Corrèze), in Toulouse (Haute-Garonne), in Grenoble (Isère) ), in Bordeaux (Gironde), Saint-Etienne (Loire), Puy-en-Velay (Haute-Loire), Pau (Pyrénées-Atlantiques) and Villeurbanne (Rhône).
