France police bill protests draw thousands

Thousands of people marched in Paris and other French cities on September 20 against a proposed French law on police and gendarme use of force, which critics say would give officers a “licence to kill.”

Deputies in the National Assembly approved the bill in July. It says a law-enforcement official who uses force is assumed to have acted legally when using their weapon. The bill now faces a Senate vote.

Politicians, rights groups and activists joined the Paris protest, including Mathilde Panot of the hard-left France Unbowed party. Panot called for the bill to be voted down in the Senate and said there could be no “organised police impunity.”

Amnesty International, France's magistrates' union and the country's League of Human Rights also took part. Amal Bentousi, whose brother Amine was shot in the back by police in 2012 in Seine-Saint-Denis, said the bill was intended to “reverse the burden of proof” in such incidents.

Scores of other marches against the bill were organised around France over the weekend. Police said 4,500 people rallied in Lyon and 3,700 in Toulouse.

A petition against the bill on the National Assembly website gathered 730,000 signatures, but a parliamentary law committee dismissed it in July.

Defenders of the bill say it would prevent law enforcement officers from automatically coming under suspicion or being detained when they use armed force. Cedric Picard of Amnesty International said at the Marseille protest that the organisation feared police violence would grow under the law.

On Saturday, French Interior Minister Laurent Nunez called on police to be “particularly vigilant” during the protests. In Rennes, officials said eight people were arrested and three police officers were injured after projectiles were thrown at them.