France: Violent Paris protest arrest video sparks backlash

The nation is on edge following the death of a teenager near Paris who was shot and killed by police after driving away from a routine traffic stop.

The country is in the midst of its worst rioting since 2005 and the way police responded to protesters over the weekend won’t make things any better.

Footage from the streets of Paris, shared on social media, shows police using extremely heavy-handed tactics. At one point, a woman was violently shoved to the ground.

At another point, a man — the brother of a man who died in police custody seven years ago — grapples with police who eventually arrest him.

Youssouf Traore, 29, was detained by police Saturday amid protests across the country that commemorated the death of his brother Adama Traore, a black 24-year-old, in 2016, many of them in defiance of police bans on gatherings.

According to a police source, Youssouf Traore was injured in the eye during his arrest at the Paris protest attended by some 2000 people, and was taken to hospital after becoming sick at the police station.

Traore appeared with a swollen right eye at a gathering on Sunday in support of another man who was arrested at the rally, an AFP journalist saw.

According to a medical report seen by AFP, he suffered a fractured nose, head trauma with a black eye, and contusions to his chest, abdomen and lumbar.

Traore’s lawyer Yassine Bouzrou said he had filed a complaint for deliberate violence.

Traore was arrested on charges of violence against a public official, having been accused of hitting a police officer at the start of the rally at Place de la Republique, according to a source close to the case.

Traore said he was the victim of “injustice” and denied attacking the police officer.

His sister Assa Traore denounced a police “ambush” and said the images of the arrest revived painful memories.

“My brother (Adama) died in exactly the same way,” she said.

The second arrested man left custody on Sunday, the campaign group set up in Adama Traore’s memory told AFP.

The Paris prosecutor’s office said the investigation into Youssouf Traore “was continuing”, while the second man was summoned to appear before a magistrate at a later date.

The forceful arrest of Youssouf Traore, filmed by several witnesses, showed him resisting and being tackled and held face down by several police officers, sparking condemnation by several left-wing politicians on social media.

Left-leaning associations, unions and political parties called for another day of mobilisation against police violence in Paris on July 15.

France has been on edge since a police officer shot dead Nahel M., a 17-year-old with Algerian roots, during a traffic stop on June 27 in a Paris suburb.

The shooting rekindled long pent-up frustrations and accusations of systemic racism among France’s security forces and sparked nights of rioting, the worst urban unrest in the country since 2005.

More than 3700 people were taken into police custody in connection with the protests since Nahel’s death, including at least 1160 minors, according to official figures.