Demonstrators return to the streets of Paris.
Hundreds of French protesting racism and police brutality demonstrated despite the bans announced by the security institutions.
Hundreds of French protesters took to the streets of central Paris on Saturday, defying a ban on police brutality announced by the Macron government, a week after violent demonstrations in response to the police killing of a 17-year-old teenager.
Adama Traore, a 24-year-old black French man, died in July 2016 after being arrested by French police forces in a detention center in the northern suburbs of Paris.
Since then, every year on the anniversary of the death of this young black man, the city of Paris has staged demonstrations against racism and police brutality in France with the call of his family.
According to “Reuters” news agency, in this regard, the annual demonstration was supposed to be held again on Saturday, July 17, in two areas in the north of Paris, but the French authorities decided to hold it in view of the eight nights of violent nationwide gatherings in protest against the murder. Nael Marzouq, a 17-year-old teenager, was arrested by the police on the 6th of July.
In addition, the authorities of the city of Paris also opposed the call of Sister Adama Traore to hold another demonstration in the place of Republic Square in the center of the city of Paris.
Despite these bans, hundreds of protesters made the center of Paris their demonstration scene. Police forces attacked the demonstrators in the Republic Square of this city, but the protesters gathered again on Magenta Boulevard.
“It is possible that this demonstration will attract radical elements willing to commit violent acts,” Paris police chief Laurent Nunez told The Guardian.
Youssef Traore, one of Adama Traore’s brothers, was arrested by police officers during today’s demonstration on the charge of “violence against a public official”, the French newspaper Le Figaro reported.
On Friday, the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination requested France to “address the structural and systematic causes of racial discrimination among the law enforcement forces of this country, especially the police, by giving priority.”
Official statistics published by the French media indicate that so far nearly 4,000 people have been arrested by the French police in connection with the protests held since the murder of Nael Marzouq.
French authorities also banned another demonstration that was scheduled to take place on Saturday in the northern city of Lille. Demonstrators held a rally in the city of Marseille after leaving the center of the country and changing the route of the march.
