Laura Laplaud with AFP
modified to
11:47 a.m., November 26, 2023
Around 80 ultra-right activists, hooded and dressed in black, marched on Saturday evening in the streets of the popular Monnaie district in Romans-sur-Isère behind a banner “Justice for Thomas, neither forgiveness nor forgetting”, chanting ” The street, France, belongs to us,” according to images posted on social networks by the ultra-right. A gathering which comes a week after the death of Thomas, the 16-year-old high school student, fatally injured during a ball in Drôme.
They “shouted racist and Islamophobic slogans”
20 people were arrested, 17 of whom were taken into custody following violence against the police. According to Manuel Bompard, coordinator of La France insoumise, guest of the Grand Rendez-vous d’Europe 1-CNews-Les Echos on Sunday, it was not “a peaceful demonstration to obtain justice for Thomas” but of “an attempted raid organized by far-right groups who met in Romans-sur-Isère and who shouted racist and Islamophobic slogans,” he assured.
“I hope and I ask that the Minister of the Interior takes the necessary measures to ensure that this type of attacks by these small groups of the extreme right stops immediately, that the loops on digital messaging which are put in place to allow them to organize are closed, that the small violent groups which are also pointed out in an information report of the National Assembly as a major threat to public order, with 1,300 people of the ultra-right registered S , are put out of harm’s way,” he continued.
On Saturday, fireworks mortars were fired, trash cans deployed to act as a barrier, but nothing was set on fire, according to a police source.
“When the family asks for an apolitical white march, the very principle of political leaders is to remain silent”
At the microphone of Europe 1-CNews, Manuel Bompard also tackles some of his political opponents, like Marine Le Pen, Jordan Bardella, Marion Maréchal or Eric Zemmour. “Everyone came on television sets to try to give a political interpretation of these acts while the investigation is still ongoing and even this morning, the prosecutor says that the unfolding of the facts has not yet been clarified” , he said before calling on the political class to respect the requests of Thomas’ family, namely not to try to politically recover this tragedy. “When she [la famille] takes the initiative to organize a white march and asks that it be apolitical, the very principle of political leaders is to remain silent,” he thundered.
Last weekend, a “brawl”, in the words of the public prosecutor in Valencia, broke out in front of the Crépol village hall where a ball bringing together around 400 people was taking place. Mortally injured, Thomas died while being transported to hospital. In addition to this death, the violence left eight people injured, including two seriously.