EXCESSIVE USE OF FORCE IN FRANCE

ACCORDING TO THE UN

In a speech to the Human Rights Council in Geneva, Michelle Bachelet said that yellow vests are protesting against

"What they consider to be (their) exclusion from economic rights and from (their) participation in public affairs".

"We encourage the (French) government to continue the dialogue and urgently call for a thorough investigation of all reports of excessive use of force," said Michelle Bachelet .

High Commissioner Michelle Bachelet also recalled that "inequality affects all countries" and that "even in prosperous states, people feel excluded from the benefits of development and deprived of economic and social rights" .

However, she cited France as a prosperous country, but denounced the violent repression of recent protests in Sudan, Zimbabwe and Haiti.

"France assured Wednesday that it would follow the recommendations of the UN, while" surprising " to be on the same list as Venezuela or Haiti.

Would it have become a banana republic?

"Obviously we will follow the recommendations with the necessary diligence , " said government spokesman Benjamin Griveaux during the minutes of the council of ministers at the Elysee.

"It is necessary, I say it nevertheless, to be astonished all the same to be found quoted in a list between Venezuela and Haiti where there were deaths, I remind it, of the numerous deaths, following demonstrations", a he added.

And how many deaths since the Yellow Vests demonstrations in France?

Benjamin Griveaux also recalls that "162 investigations were opened as of March 1".

The protesters "demand a respectful dialogue and real reforms. And yet, in many cases, they are greeted by violent and excessive use of force, by arbitrary detentions ... ", she lamented.

Several demonstrators claim to have been injured by launcher shots of defense (LBD) in France . Videos taken during events reveal particularly severe injuries, such as the loss of an eye or a hand torn off ...

The High Commissioner for Human Rights is not the first representative of a European or international body to denounce the excessive use of force in demonstrations of "yellow vests".

On February 14, it was up to a group of experts from the UN Human Rights Council to issue a ground-breaking communiqué on the subject, saying that "the right to demonstrate in France has been disproportionately restricted." While giving the figure of 1700 wounded.

On 25 February, it was the Council of Europe's turn to call on France to suspend the use of LBDs.

"The injuries caused by LBD shots reveal a disproportionate use of force, as well as the maladjustment of this type of weapon in the context of law enforcement operations," noted the Commissioner of Human Rights. Man of the ECHR, Dunja Mijatovic, in a ten-page memorandum.