France: Police Accused of Brutality Against Minors at Protests

Paris, France – Enzo, 17, says one police officer held his arms while another struck him from behind with a baton. His head was covered in blood; he was hospitalized and required numerous stitches.

Eden, 14, cannot currently speak. His jaw was shattered after an officer fired a tear-gas grenade into his face at Saint-Ouen-l'Aumone.

Mael, 16, cannot see out of his right eye after being hit by a rubber bullet fired by police.

Since mid-September, when French high school students began protesting an education system they say has failed them, police tactics have come under close scrutiny. Lawyers and protesters told Al Jazeera that officers are stoking violence and resentment rather than seeking to ease tensions.

While the French government defends police actions as necessary, violence against minors will deepen the divide between the state and its citizens, according to experts and lawyers.

"They are losing a generation," said Ainoha Pascual, a lawyer with the Paris Bar. "The government is carrying out a strategy of terror. Because when you cripple someone, when you seriously injure someone, it means that person — and really everyone around them — will not come back to protest."

The education protests have grown into a nationwide movement, with violent clashes over the past weekend.

'I am still traumatised'

In Enzo's case, videos verified by Al Jazeera show a crowd of peaceful teachers forming a cordon in front of students. Police officers break through the line and, as they advance, use batons and tear-gas spray at close range. Panicked screams ring out everywhere.

"I am still traumatised. Instead of protecting us, they attacked us," Enzo said.

According to his lawyer, Elsa Marcel, Eden was sitting alone on a low wall looking at his phone a few meters from the school protest when three officers approached. Video of the incident appears to show one officer striking the teenager with a baton before another fires a tear-gas grenade into his face. Marcel said the shot was fired from about 1.5 meters away, and accused the officers of leaving the boy on the ground without calling for emergency services. His family has filed a complaint for attempted murder.

"In this social movement, this is unprecedented, especially when all of these people are minors," said Mathilde Lante, Enzo's lawyer and a member of the Legal Action Group (CAJ).

French authorities deny that police are carrying out repression during the high school protests, pointing to hundreds of law enforcement personnel injured.

In early October, Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said no "restraint directive" had been issued to police, stressing that the use of force must be proportionate. Also in early October, the Justice Ministry instructed prosecutors to pursue swift and firm responses to violence at protests, including considering parents' civil liability for the actions of minors.

Meanwhile, France's police watchdog IGPN has opened 36 investigations into allegations of misconduct. Nearly 6,900 people have been taken into police custody since the protests began, 86 percent of them minors, according to Interior Ministry figures.

Such a hardline stance appears only to have galvanized protesters further.

More than half a million people took to the streets over the past weekend, about 100,000 of them in the capital, Paris.

"We are too young to be taken seriously; we are old enough to be beaten," was one of the slogans repeated again and again.

On Saturday, police fired tear gas and stun grenades long before the marches began, a move critics say set a tense tone for the day.

Police blocked the roads leading out of a square in Paris. Only a few narrow exits were left for people to leave the site. That meant thousands were trapped and crushed together, leading to fainting and panic attacks.

This is what experts call "la nasse," or kettling, a controversial tactic in which police surround and hold protesters. It has long been criticized by human rights groups for infringing on freedom of movement and the right to protest.

Allegations of police brutality over the years

The student-led protests have ultimately fueled broader discontent in a country facing financial and political crises and now a social one. At times, the streets of Paris have become scenes of violence and vandalism.

On Saturday and Sunday, as night fell, groups of youths looted, set fires and ransacked stores in riots.

"Over the past three weeks, we heard that 'the police kill' or 'the police injure.' And then, over the past two days, we were asked, 'What are the police doing?' A very French kind of schizophrenia," Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu said on Monday.

This is not the first time police have faced criticism.

During the "yellow vest" protests — a period of unrest that began in 2018 over a diesel tax increase and grew into a social movement in which demonstrators wore yellow vests — officers were criticized for their use of force, with protesters seriously injured by rubber bullets and stun grenades.

In June 2023, the police killing of 17-year-old Nahel Merzouk during a traffic stop in Nanterre sparked days of riots and renewed debate over racism and police violence.

Environmental activists have also accused the authorities of excessive force, particularly during a 2023 protest against a reservoir in Sainte-Soline, where clashes left dozens of protesters and police injured.

Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have repeatedly raised concerns about the use of excessive force and restrictions on the right to protest.

Paolo Stuppia, a sociology lecturer at Sciences Po Paris and co-author of the book Geopolitique de la jeunesse, believes tensions between protesters and police have worsened under French President Emmanuel Macron.

"What was once reserved for the suburbs or autonomous activist groups is now being applied to everyone," he said. "There is an atmosphere of suspicion between protesters and police, and it is growing because police repression now affects more people."

'French-style' crowd control

Lawyer Pascual argues that the severity of police violence is closely tied to the use of crowd-control weapons that can cause permanent, life-changing injuries. Rubber-bullet guns and blast grenades have been at the center of controversy over policing tactics in the country.

"This is really what we call 'French-style' crowd control — very specific and involving the use of weapons, including weapons described as non-lethal but which in reality are capable of inflicting lethal injuries," she said.

Interior Minister Nunez suspended the use of stun grenades after a teenager lost a hand. But ahead of Saturday's marches, he said they could be used in cases of "urban violence," adding that they are "never used when things are going well."

On Saturday, they were used extensively.

Al Jazeera journalists on the ground saw police firing tear gas and stun grenades repeatedly, long before the march began.

Pascual questioned whether the use of force is effective in restoring order, arguing that de-escalation could help rebuild trust between police and protesters.

"When you watch video of police deciding to put down their shields and take off their helmets, what do you see?" she asked. "The protesters facing them stop and applaud. In France, we don't do that."