Testimonials
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More than forty people were arrested and placed in police custody, on the sidelines of the traditional May Day mobilization which brought together thousands of demonstrators in Paris. Some of them denounce police violence and unworthy detention conditions.
Michael (1) is 20 years old. On May 1, with his “climate genocide” sign, the student in geography and environmental science at the Sorbonne University manifests between Republic and Nation, in Paris, with committed friends. “There is a convergence between the environmental movements and those of the workers”, he feels compelled to call back. Lylia (1), she is almost 24 years old, is taking part in her first “true” expression. The one who went to march against the extreme right a month earlier is not “not at all a regular” processions. After several months of job search, she had to start a new CDD the next day. The two twenty-somethings do not know each other. They are among the 47 people arrested by the police – along with the woman who attacked a firefighter trying to put out a barricade fire – after a day marked by numerous damage and clashes. That day, eight policemen and gendarmes were injured.
In the wrong place at the wrong time, these protesters? They recount their arrest around 5:30 p.m., when the procession arrives at Place de la Nation, in the east of Paris. “Even if there are always thugs who degrade, the atmosphere is good-natured, there is music, Michael begins. We just arrived…