One of the latest investigations concerns a police officer kneeing a demonstrator in the face on Thursday during the demonstration at Place de la Bastille in Paris.
Investigations by the “police of the police” are piling up. Twenty-four investigations have been opened by the General Inspectorate of the National Police (IGPN), for acts committed since the start of the mobilization of high school students, the Ministry of the Interior announced on Friday October 9. One of the latest investigations concerns a police officer kneeing a demonstrator in the face on Thursday during the demonstration at Place de la Bastille in Paris.
The high school student movement is experiencing a “clear deceleration”, says the executive. The dynamics of the mobilization are now “very localized” in certain departments, a source within the executive explained to France Télévisions on Friday, confirming information from AFP. The damage caused on the sidelines of the demonstrations or blockades cost "at least 30 million euros", reported this same source.
The UN warns against “a disproportionate use of force” against demonstrators. “We call on everyone to ensure that they [these demonstrations] remain peaceful and that there is no disproportionate use of force by law enforcement. The right to peaceful assembly must be respected,” declared a spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Shabia Mantoo, during a press briefing in Geneva.
At least 6,877 people were taken into custody, 86% of whom were minors. The Ministry of Justice, which communicated these figures, stopped its count at 5 p.m. Thursday. “At this stage, 2,376 people are being prosecuted,” including 1,923 minors, specifies the same source.
The 3,000 teachers “will learn their assignment during the day”. During a trip to Cachan (Val-de-Marne), Friday morning, the Minister of National Education, Edouard Geffray affirmed that the teachers concerned were “in the process of being contacted”.
Nearly 140 high schools closed on Friday, or less than 4% of the total. In detail, “more than 96%” of the country’s 3,700 high schools are “open”. A stable figure compared to Thursday, specifies the Ministry of National Education. Blocking actions resumed at dawn, notably at the University of Paris-Panthéon-Assas.
The high school student who had his hand torn off on Monday by a stun grenade on the sidelines of the mobilization of high school students in Lens (Pas-de-Calais) picked up the grenade before it exploded in his hand, according to the first elements of the investigation communicated this Friday by the Béthune public prosecutor's office.
The Béthune prosecutor, Etienne Thieffry, who opened an investigation entrusted to the IGPN concerning the teenager whose hand was torn off by a stun grenade in Lens (Pas-de-Calais) on Monday, on the sidelines of the high school mobilization, provides details on "the precise chronology of events". He states that the police officer who threw this grenade "acted on orders from the command authority and carried out this firing in accordance with the operating procedure recommended by the training documentation".
“At this stage, there is no video available to investigators allowing them to visualize the explosion of the stun grenade,” continues the magistrate in a press release. He adds that "all the testimonies collected (...) with the exception of one, converge on the fact that the grenade was fired at a long distance (80 meters) and that it landed on the ground before several demonstrators approached it and one of them grabbed it until it exploded."
The Béthune prosecutor specifies that the 15-year-old high school student “was examined by a forensic doctor who confirmed the mutilation of his hand and fixed his total incapacity for work at at least 2 months”. “He still remains hospitalized and will be interviewed by investigators as soon as the medical profession authorizes it,” adds the prosecutor’s press release.
