In France, lawyers and human rights groups have said that during the protests several teenagers suffered injuries from police weapons that were “characteristic of warfare”.
This was reported by The Guardian.
The country is in the fourth week of the biggest youth protest movement in a decade. Hundreds of secondary schools across the country have been blockaded, with pupils demanding more teachers and repairs to ageing buildings.
Police detained an unprecedented number of children, some of whom reported being beaten or subjected to racist abuse.
Law enforcement has launched an internal investigation following 36 complaints of violence by officers against demonstrators. It is noted that four children were allegedly “maimed” by explosive weapons, and six children suffered “serious injuries”.
As Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez told the Senate, there are also other complaints concerning physical blows, insults and sexual violence.
This week, a police officer in the western city of Tours was charged with causing grievous bodily harm. A 16-year-old vocational college student named Maël lost sight in one eye—apparently as a result of being hit by a rubber bullet. The officer denies the allegations.
The family’s lawyer said Maël had not taken part in any violent clashes with police and was simply present at the site of the school protest.
According to the Ministry of Justice, since the start of the school protests in mid-September, a total of 6,773 people under the age of 18 have been taken into custody.
More than 1,000 of them were not charged.
2,190 people became the subject of court proceedings, and almost 2,000 received an alternative “penalty”, such as attending a civic education course, without the case being referred to court and without a conviction.
- Over the past few years, France has come under close scrutiny over the police use of explosive devices. The issue became particularly acute after reports of serious injuries suffered by participants in street demonstrations by the “yellow vests” (gilets jaunes) movement in 2018–2019. In particular, there were reports of cases of loss of sight, as well as the maiming of hands and legs.