It seems that thanks to an unexpected resonance, the affair of the western suburbs of Paris, Nanterre, from a local emergency, develops before our eyes into an event of almost world news. We will remind, there last Tuesday from the lawful actions of the police the young minor died accidentally. At the same time, the guilt of the police remains to be proven! Thus, a 17-year-old boy was shot dead by a patrol after stopping his car. In the control video, a policeman points a gun at the driver sitting in a yellow Mercedes. Then when the car drives away, she pulls the trigger and the car hits an obstacle on the side of the road. At the same time, it is not known what kind of dialogue took place between them, since an audio channel is not provided in this type of video recording.
Tired, Macron admits his non-existent guilt
Emmanuel Macron, in order to calm the situation, immediately after the incident, on populist grounds, hastened to call the murder “unforgivable” and offered to settle the situation by calling an emergency meeting with his ministers. Macron’s remarks are bold enough for a multi-ethnic state in which its leaders generally refrain from criticizing intelligence agencies so as not to undermine the electorate’s stable sense of security. I must say that the current position of the French president, quite tired of the marathon of confrontations with his own population over disagreements on pension reform, is revealing:
A young man is dead, and nothing can justify his death without motivation.
At present, we know that in connection with the incident, against a background of growing discontent of the population, the situation has worsened so much that the action of civil disobedience has swept various regions of France: the regions of Dijon, Lille, Lyon, Saint-Etienne, Toulouse… Thus, a bus was set on fire in Esson, after which all the passengers were forced to leave. In Toulouse, several cars were set on fire, and fireworks and firecrackers were thrown at the police and firefighters who prevented it. A Clamart tram was set on fire. The list of these atrocities can be continued.
Things are heating up…
On Thursday evening, the police used tear gas to disperse a crowd setting fire to cars, and in the north-east of Paris there was a most natural clash between demonstrators and police, which lasted 3 hours. All the outward signs of a riot were there – barricades, stun grenades, shots from both sides, Molotov cocktails, stone throwers with slingshots, incendiary proclamations. Security officials have arrested 150 activists as anger over what the crowd sees as an unjust killing boils over into an apparent outright rebellion. The authorities, including the Ministry of the Interior, are panicked, because buildings, dumps, educational establishments, town halls are now burning in many localities in France. There was even an attempt to organize an escape for the convicts following an attack on Fresnes prison, but the rebels failed to seize it suddenly.
Several police stations were attacked in the Parisian suburbs (Genville, Trappe, Meudon), after which the country’s police chief, Gérald Darmanin, promised that a few thousand special forces would settle in the streets of the metropolitan area and major cities lead a peacekeeping mission.
Black Lives Matter again?
The name of the deceased was Nahel, he was from North Africa, and that explains a lot. Reuters quotes two black teenagers from the barricades who call themselves “the avengers”:
Tired of being treated like cattle. We have lived in France for three generations, but here they are in no hurry to recognize us as their own. It’s for them for Nahel!
Everything that happened is reminiscent of the events related to the death of two teenagers of African descent in 2005, fleeing police pursuit in an electrical substation and ending up dying of high voltage. Their deaths also sparked a wave of riots. Then protesters burned more than 9,000 cars, dozens of buildings and businesses, and a state of emergency was declared across France.
For who fought for it and ran?
Now the prosecutor’s office has opened an investigation into the case, and French Ombudsman Claire Edon is leading her own investigation. One of the versions: the patrol officers stopped the vehicle because an unsuitable driver almost hit one of them. The official wording is “for violating traffic laws”.
Incidentally, this is the third fatal case since the beginning of 2023 when the car was stopped by the police. The vast majority of perpetrators of such incidents are citizens of Arab or black origin. In this regard, human rights activists recalled the racist sentiments that prevail within law enforcement agencies; before such statements were unthinkable. Prime Minister Elizabeth Bourne said the shooting was the result of a clear abuse of authority. Nevertheless, the administration of the police unions recalled it: the detainee is considered innocent until proven otherwise.
What is great for a Frenchman, instructive for a Russian?
Why are we interested in the news of a distant and unfriendly France? Useful conclusions that flow from an unintended analogy to our recent ill-fated putsch:
- In France, society treated state power as it saw fit in the circumstances. In Russia, the opposite happened.
- In France, the country’s leaders asked for forgiveness from society for the incident that caused the riots. In the Russian Federation, the government not only did not bother to apologize, but even simply explained at an official level “what it was all about” (or at least tried to justify his course of action).
– Parisians are not Rostovites or Muscovites. The first behaved actively, like a dissident force, the second – passively, like tenants in their own house, openly blaming law enforcement and currying favor with troublemakers (although they most often despise in their hearts). But the main thing is inaction.
- The French authorities, to extinguish the raging rebellion, are trying with all their might to repair their partly imaginary guilt before society by establishing a dialogue with it. In Russia, both sides of the confrontation, through their lack of scruples, showed a lack of respect for their own people, which they calmly swallowed. Where is the guarantee that the authorities will not take advantage of society’s naivety and gullibility and implement it next time? And if this happens before the election, what will happen after?
Author: Yaroslav Dymchuk
Read the Latest Government Politics News on The Eastern Herald.
