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CURFEW

Several hurt as French police break up mass rave

Eleven police officers were injured in the early hours of Saturday morning in western France, as they broke up a 1,500-strong illegal rave, authorities said, with one party-goer losing a hand in the clashes.

Published: 20 June 2021 12:39 CEST
Several hurt as French police break up mass rave
Police break up an illegal rave in France. Photo: LOIC VENANCE / AFP

Police fired teargas to disperse the crowd, who defied an 11pm coronavirus curfew on Friday June 18th and just stayed on into Saturday afternoon in the area around a racecourse near Redon in Brittany.

There were “very violent clashes” when 400 police intervened, prefect Emmanuel Berthier said, adding the violence lasted more than seven hours through the night.

“The rave party at Redon has ended,” he announced after police had cleared the area.

Police detained five men and opened an inquiry into violence against people in positions of public authority.

According to the authorities, 11 police officers were injured, two of whom were taken to hospital. Two of the ravers were also hurt, including a 22-year-old man who lost a hand.

Berthier said the “people had an objective, to confront the forces of public order”.

Firebombs, metal balls, breeze blocks

Berthier told AFP that the group threw “Molotov cocktails, metal balls and bits of breeze blocks”.

A police officer said it was not usual for people to bring the metal balls used in the French sport of boules or petanque to a rave.

Event organisers said police had chosen violence instead of dialogue by firing tear gas grenades.

“It was war,” said Flo, a 22-year-old man who attended the event. “There hasn’t been any music since last night,” but “people taking part in the illegal rave are still on the scene,” the prefect’s office had told AFP early Saturday.

Local authorities had on Friday banned the party, which came two days before the coronavirus curfew is set to be lifted on Sunday, June 20th as Covid-19 case numbers fall in France.

The rave had originally been set up in memory of a young man killed in nearby city Nantes two years ago during the annual nationwide Fête de la Musique celebration.

Prosecutors said Friday that Steve Maia Canico fell into the Loire river when police moved in to break up the gathering.

His body was found more than a month later and protesters in Nantes have demanded “Justice for Steve”, saying the police intervention was disproportionate.

Hundreds of people flouted France’s coronavirus curfew with underground parties near Dijon and a village in western Brittany, while police managed to prevent organisers from staging a major rave in Paris.

READ ALSO: Mini concerts in bars and no curfew: What’s changed for France’s Fête de la Musique this year?

Member comments

  1. A rather over the top response to a few miscreants that were looking for trouble. In a situation like this, diplomacy is often the best policy especially when dealing with the young hyped up ravers.

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HEALTH

France’s Covid-19 app to be ‘put to sleep’

France's Covid-tracker app, used for months for the all-important 'health pass' will be switched off today, health officials have confirmed.

Published: 30 June 2023 13:29 CEST
France’s Covid-19 app to be 'put to sleep'

Covid-19 screening in France reaches an important milestone on Friday, June 30th, 2023 – when the TousAntiCovid app is officially ‘put to sleep’.

The app, which was launched in June 2020 as France came out of its first lockdown of the pandemic and has undergone a number of iterations, including as a delivery device for the health pass, will be switched off. 

For most people, this anniversary will pass without mention. Few people have consulted the app in recent months, and it has sat dormant on many smartphones since France’s Covid-19 health pass requirement was suspended in March 2022.

Meanwhile, the Système d’Informations de DEPistage (SI-DEP) interface – which has been informing people about their test results since the Spring of 2020 – is also being shut down on June 30th, as per legal requirements.

The SI-DEP shutdown means that it will also be impossible to retrieve Covid test certificates issued before June 30th, should the need arise. All data held by the database will be “destroyed”, officials have said.

It has handled more than 320 million antigen and PCR tests since it was introduced.

This does not mean that testing for Covid-19 has stopped, or is now unnecessary. As reported recently, more than 1,000 deaths a week in Europe are still caused by the virus.

The shutdown of the national information system does not mean that people in France cannot still book an appointment for an antigen test at a pharmacy, or a PCR test at a laboratory. But the number of people going for testing is declining rapidly. In recent days, according to Le Parisien, just 15,000 people in France took a Covid test – the lowest number, it said, since the pandemic started.

Reimbursement rules for testing changed on March 1st, with only certain categories of people – minors, those aged 65 and over, or immunosuppressed patients – covered for the entire cost of testing.

From Friday, only PCR test results will be transmitted to authorities for data purposes, meaning pharmacists that only offer antigen testing will be locked out of the online interface to record test results.

The reason for the shift in priorities is to maintain “minimal epidemiological surveillance”, the Ministry of Health has reportedly told scientists.

As a result test certificates, showing a positive or negative result, will no longer be issued from July 1st. Since February 1st, anyone taking a test has had to give consent to share their data in order to obtain a certificate. 

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