France is burning. Violence has gripped the European nation for five days. Thousands have been arrested after 40,000 police were deployed overnight on Thursday as there was rioting across France. The anger was triggered after a 17-year-old French driver of Algerian descent was shot dead at point-blank range by a police officer for failing to comply during a traffic stop.
The killing of the boy, named Nahel M, has led to unprecedented anger. The police at first reportedly lied and accused the youth of trying to run over officers. But soon a cell phone video emerged – it showed the French police brandishing rifles and executing the teen in the Parisian suburb of Nanterre. No officer was standing in front of the yellow Mercedes that Nahel was driving.
The police officer who fired the bullet at Nahel has been detained and charged with voluntary homicide. However, this is not an isolated incident. French policing has been marred with cases of systemic racist violence, which is often brushed under the carpetThe statistics are shocking. In 2022 alone, there were 138 documented incidences of French police firing shots at moving cars, while 13 people died in shootings that took place during traffic stops, reports Deutsche Welle (DW). There were three such incidents in 2021 and two in 2020. Most victims since 2017 have been Black or of Arab
A French law passed in 2017 allows police to shoot when the driver or occupants of a vehicle ignore an order to stop and are deemed to pose a risk to the officer’s life or physical safety, or other people’s. The cops can fire without having to justify their decision on grounds of self-defence. The Guardian quotes researcher Sebastian Roché as saying that the number of fatal shootings against moving vehicles has
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