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France Mobilizes 40,000 Forces To Deal With Unrest

By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News

PARIS (Worthy News) – France mobilized 40,000 additional security forces on Thursday to deal with spreading unrest following the deadly police shooting of a teenager of Algerian and Moroccan descent.

President Emmanuel Macron struggled to restore calm and held another emergency security meeting Thursday about the escalating violence.

Tensions also rose in Nanterre, the working class town on the western outskirts of Paris, where 17-year-old Nahel M., also identified as Nael, was shot dead Tuesday. Protesters torched cars, barricaded streets, and hurled projectiles at police following a peaceful vigil, witnesses said.

Demonstrators scrawled “Vengeance for Nahel,” who was earlier named Nael, across buildings and bus shelters, and as night set, a bank was lit on fire before firemen put it out.

The national police also reported new incidents in the cities of Marseille, Lyon, Pau, Toulouse, and Lille, including fires and fireworks.

In Marseille, France’s second city, police fired tear gas grenades during clashes with youths in the tourist hot spot of Le Vieux Port, the city’s leading paper La Provence reported.

“These acts are totally unjustifiable,” Macron said at the beginning of a security meeting aimed at securing hot spots and planning for the coming days “so full peace can return.”

‘REMEMBRANCE AND RESPECT’

Macron stressed it was time for “remembrance and respect” as Nahel’s mother had called for a “silent march” Thursday that thousands to Nelson Mandela Square, where he was killed.

Some marchers had “Justice for Nahel” printed on their T-shirts. “The police kill,” read one marcher’s placard.

“I’m afraid of what might come next,” said marcher Amira Taoubas, a mother of four boys, including the eldest, 11. “I’d like it to stop and that it never happens again. It’s just not possible to die like this for no reason. I wouldn’t want it to happen to my own children,” she told reporters.

Bouquets of orange and yellow roses marked the site of the shooting.

Tuesday’s incident underscored longstanding complaints of police violence and systemic racism inside law enforcement agencies.

Rights groups say police abuse is especially reported in the low-income, racially mixed suburbs that ring major cities in France, including Paris, the capital.

The local prosecutor said the officer involved had been put under formal investigation for voluntary homicide and would be held in prison in preventive detention.

ILLEGALLY USING WEAPON

“The public prosecutor considers that the legal conditions for using the weapon have not been met,” Pascal Prache, the prosecutor, told reporters.

Under France’s legal system, being placed under formal investigation is akin to being charged in Anglo-Saxon jurisdictions.

The teenager was shot during Tuesday’s morning rush hour. He initially failed to stop after the Mercedes AMG he was driving was spotted in a bus lane, according to investigators. Two police officers caught up with the car in a traffic jam.

When the car was made to get away, one officer fired at close range through the driver’s window, several sources said. Nahel died from a single shot through his left arm and chest, Nanterre public prosecutor Pascal Prache explained.

A detained officer acknowledged firing a lethal shot telling investigators he wanted to prevent a car chase, the prosecutor added. The young driver reportedly feared he or another person would be hurt after the teenager allegedly committed several previous traffic violations.

The officer’s lawyer Laurent-Franck Lienard said his client had aimed down toward the driver’s leg but was bumped, causing him to shoot towards his chest.

“He had to be stopped, but obviously (the officer) didn’t want to kill the driver,” Lienard stressed on BFM TV, adding that his client’s detention was being used “to try to calm rioters.”

There were no signs of calm returning soon to the streets of France, where several people were killed in traffic stops in 2023 and previous years, most of the people of migrant descent, records show.