French policing under scrutiny as student protest injuries mount

A Reuters investigation published Saturday documented 28 cases of injuries inflicted by French police force during the wave of student protests, 15 of them now under investigation by the IGPN police watchdog, renewing calls to ban the "less lethal" weapons French police use more freely than their European counterparts.

The cases involve rubber bullets, stun grenades, tear gas, batons, and charges on horseback. In two cases a young person's eye was lost or injured by rubber bullets. A 15 year old in Lens had his hand blown off, likely by a stun grenade, according to Interior Minister Laurent Nunez, who paused the use of stun grenades pending investigation. A 14 year old suffered a broken jaw and smashed teeth from a tear gas canister. An officer is now under formal investigation in that case.

"France is an anomaly in terms of its use of arms and the number of victims. We have four irreversible injuries in the space of 12 days, and they are minors," said Sebastian Roche, a policing researcher at the French National Centre for Scientific Research. He called the level unknown in France's contemporary history. Such weapons are generally not used for public order policing in Britain, Italy, or Germany, he noted, and rights groups including Amnesty International and UN human rights experts have repeatedly criticized them as dangerous and disproportionate.

Nunez said about 200 students had been injured but that police action was very rarely the cause. Authorities said 700 police officers were also injured, schools burned or ransacked, and nearly 6,900 people arrested, mostly minors. The protests began in late September over staff shortages, crowded classrooms, long school days, and dilapidated buildings, and a new national day of action is set for Tuesday.