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France to deploy 40,000 police to deal with riots over teen’s death

Forty thousand police were deployed on Thursday evening in France - and bus and tram services halted early in Paris - as the government battled to avoid a third night of rioting, following the death of a teenage boy at the hands of police.

Published: 29 June 2023 09:03 CEST
Updated: 29 June 2023 16:44 CEST

France to deploy 40,000 police to deal with riots over teen's death

Photo by Zakaria ABDELKAFI / AFP

It was announced that 40,000 officers will be deployed on Thursday night to try and avoid a repeat of the clashes in towns and cities around France.

Paris regional transport operators said that bus and tram services will be halted at 9pm, although the Metro will continue to run as normal. The tram and bus services are for many the only connections to Paris’ outer suburbs, where the Metro does not reach.

After several trams and buses were targeted at Wednesday’s protests, the decision was made “to ensure the protection of staff and passengers,” regional president Valerie Pécresse said on Twitter.

Earlier on Thursday President Emmanuel Macron summoned his top ministers to an 8am meeting, as the country woke to further scenes of violence and arson from towns and cities around France.

At the beginning of the crisis meeting he reportedly told ministers that the violence of Wednesday night was “unjustifiable”.

“The last few hours have been marked by scenes of violence against police stations, but also schools and town halls… against institutions and the Republic,” Macron told a meeting of ministers at the interior ministry, adding that “these (attacks) are absolutely unjustifiable”.

The government did not heed calls from politicians on the right to declare a national state of emergency, and appears to be opting for trying to quell the anger over the shooting.

The officer who fired the fatal shot was on Thursday charged with voluntary homicide over the death, the prosecutor on Thursday morning gave a press conference saying there was “no justification” for his use of the weapon.

Clashes began on Tuesday night after the death of a 17-year-old boy at the hands of police in a Paris suburb, and on Wednesday night the violence spread to towns across France, including the suburbs of Lyon, Toulouse and Dijon.

Police initially said that the officer shot 17-year-old Nahel M in self defence after he refused to stop for a traffic check. However mobile phone footage widely shared on social media shows the officer pointing his gun through the window of the stationary car and shouting ‘I’ll put a bullet in your head’ before shooting at point blank range.

Macron has described the shooting as “inexplicable and inexcusable” – unusually strong words in a country where the government is traditionally reluctant to criticise police.

Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin, normally a staunch defender of the police, described the footage as “shocking . . . and not within the laws of the republic”.

The officer has been charged with manslaughter and remains in custody.

There are fears that the violence could develop into the weeks of rioting seen across France in 2005, which also began with the deaths of two young boys at the hands of police.

OPINION Paris violence could spiral into nationwide violence like 2005

The Local’s politics expert John Lichfield said: “There are worrying parrallels to 2005, on that occasion, two young men died at the hands of police after being chased into an electricity sub-station and then police lied about it.

“The difference here I think is that in 2005 that police lie was repeated by the then-interior minister – Nicolas Sarkozy – who said that the boys were criminals and there was a lot of disinformation put out and no real attempt to calm the anger that spread to pretty much every small or medium sized town in France and went on for three weeks.

“On this occasion although the police are more directly involved – an officer shot the boy at point blank range and there doesn’t seem to be any justification for it – the government has at least said that the video of the incident is shocking, nothing appears to justify what the policeman did, there will be a proper investigation.

“So the government at least seem to have learned some lessons from 2005.

“But if the riots start to spread to other towns and suburbs then it could easily spiral.”

Hear more from John and the team at The Local in the latest episode of the Talking France podcast. Download the podcast here or listen on the link below.

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Azerbaijan vehemently rejects the accusation it bears responsibility for the riots that have led to the deaths of five people and rattled the Paris government.

But it is just the latest in a litany of tensions between Paris and Baku and not the first time France has accused Azerbaijan of being behind an alleged disinformation campaign.

The riots in New Caledonia, a French territory lying between Australia and Fiji, were sparked by moves to agree a new voting law that supporters of independence from France say discriminates against the indigenous Kanak population.

Paris points to the sudden emergence of Azerbaijani flags alongside Kanak symbols in the protests, while a group linked to the Baku authorities is openly backing separatists while condemning Paris.

“This isn’t a fantasy. It’s a reality,” interior minister Gérald Darmanin told television channel France 2 when asked if Azerbaijan, China and Russia were interfering in New Caledonia.

“I regret that some of the Caledonian pro-independence leaders have made a deal with Azerbaijan. It’s indisputable,” he alleged.

But he added: “Even if there are attempts at interference… France is sovereign on its own territory, and so much the better”.

“We completely reject the baseless accusations,” Azerbaijan’s foreign ministry spokesman Ayhan Hajizadeh said.

“We refute any connection between the leaders of the struggle for freedom in Caledonia and Azerbaijan.”

In images widely shared on social media, a reportage broadcast Wednesday on the French channel TF1 showed some pro-independence supporters wearing T-shirts adorned with the Azerbaijani flag.

Tensions between Paris and Baku have grown in the wake of the 2020 war and 2023 lightning offensive that Azerbaijan waged to regain control of its breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region from ethnic Armenian separatists.

France is a traditional ally of Christian Armenia, Azerbaijan’s neighbour and historic rival, and is also home to a large Armenian diaspora.

Darmanin said Azerbaijan – led since 2003 by President Ilham Aliyev, who succeeded his father Heydar – was a “dictatorship”.

On Wednesday, the Paris government also banned social network TikTok from operating in New Caledonia.

Tiktok, whose parent company is Chinese, has been widely used by protesters. Critics fear it is being employed to spread disinformation coming from foreign countries.

Azerbaijan invited separatists from the French territories of Martinique, French Guiana, New Caledonia and French Polynesia to Baku for a conference in July 2023.

The meeting saw the creation of the “Baku Initiative Group”, whose stated aim is to support “French liberation and anti-colonialist movements”.

The group published a statement this week condemning the French parliament’s proposed change to New Caledonia’s constitution, which would allow outsiders who moved to the territory at least 10 years ago the right to vote in its elections.

Pro-independence forces say that would dilute the vote of Kanaks, who make up about 40 percent of the population.

“We stand in solidarity with our Kanak friends and support their fair struggle,” the Baku Initiative Group said.

Raphael Glucksmann, the lawmaker heading the list for the French Socialists in June’s European Parliament elections, told Public Senat television that Azerbaijan had made “attempts to interfere… for months”.

He said the underlying problem behind the unrest was a domestic dispute over election reform, not agitation fomented by “foreign actors”.

But he accused Azerbaijan of “seizing on internal problems.”

A French government source, who asked not to be named, said pro-Azerbaijani social media accounts had on Wednesday posted an edited montage purporting to show two white police officers with rifles aimed at dead Kanaks.

“It’s a pretty massive campaign, with around 4,000 posts generated by (these) accounts,” the source told AFP.

“They are reusing techniques already used during a previous smear campaign called Olympia.”

In November, France had already accused actors linked to Azerbaijan of carrying out a disinformation campaign aimed at damaging its reputation over its ability to host the Olympic Games in Paris. Baku also rejected these accusations.