On June 27, 17-year-old Nahel M. was shot dead in his car near Paris by an officer who had arrested him. Fierce protests broke out in the weeks that followed. Image Reuters
On July 14, the French national holiday, only fireworks that are set off by official bodies and professionals are allowed. The government introduced the ban to prevent a revival of the large-scale disturbances of recent weeks. After the death of 17-year-old Nahel M. by a police bullet, riots broke out in many French cities, which were accompanied by arson and looting.
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Michel Maas is foreign editor of de Volkskrant. Previously he was a war reporter and correspondent in Eastern Europe and Southeast Asia.
French Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne is clearly apprehensive about new disturbances. She told Le Parisien on Saturday that her government would deploy “heavy resources” “to protect the French”. On July 14, France commemorates the storming of the Bastille on July 14, 1789. That storming was a defining event in the French Revolution. The celebration of Quatorze Juillet is traditionally accompanied by a lot of fireworks.
Violent demonstrations
The fireworks ban followed a ban on a demonstration in Paris on Saturday. There, a judge ruled that the unrest was still too fresh: ‘Although the violence has decreased in recent days, we cannot (…) assume that all risks of disturbance of public order have disappeared.’ Other demonstrations continued without any problems.
Nahel M. was shot dead in his car on June 27 in the Parisian suburb of Nanterre by an officer who had arrested him. The death of the boy led to an outburst of anger: violent demonstrations broke out in Paris as well as in other major cities such as Marseille and Lyon, which then spread to numerous smaller French cities.
France had not had riots of this magnitude since 2005. At the time, it was three weeks of unrest after three young people of North African descent, on the run from the police, hid in an electricity substation and were electrocuted there.
The officer who shot Nahel M. will be charged with wrongful death. On Thursday, a French judge extended his pretrial detention to give the Public Prosecution Service more time to prepare the case.
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2023-07-09 19:03:28
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