The leader of the ultra-right Zouaves group imprisoned

Finished playing. The head of the ultra-right Zouaves group, Marc de Cacqueray-Valmenier, was imprisoned Thursday evening, AFP learned on Friday from the Bobigny prosecutor’s office. According to a judicial source at LCI, he now stays in the prison of Health, in Paris.

The 23-year-old activist was arrested in Saint-Cloud (Hauts-de-Seine) following the violation of his judicial control. He had participated on Saturday, in Paris, in a rally on the sidelines of the demonstrations against the vaccination pass, which was forbidden to him. According to this same judicial source at LCI, it is an arrest on the warrant of the investigating judge who, in accordance with the requisitions of the prosecution, seized the judge of freedoms and detention.

“Inside these nice demonstrators, there were (members) of the Zouaves, and in particular the person who is the leader of the Zouaves who had punched during the meeting of Mr. Zemmour”, said Thursday the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, on franceinfo. “We see him with a megaphone to evoke the slogans”added the Minister.

During this same demonstration organized by the movement of the Patriots of Florian Philippot, two image reporter journalists (JRI) from Agence France-Presse and their two security guards were violently attacked by a group of about fifty of people, identified as far-right. AFP filed a complaint for “intentional violence in meetings”, “death threats” and “obstructing freedom of expression”.

Gérald Darmanin had for his part asked the Paris police headquarters on Sunday to report to the courts after the dissemination of a controversial photo taken during the parade. “Clapping” or “Nazi salute”? In this shot, we can see a group of militants with outstretched arms, raised to the sky, which can suggest the Nazi salute.

On the political level, he deplored “a kind of complacency vis-à-vis the far right”, considering that there was “obviously more than the President of the Republic and the government to denounce the small steps of the filthy beast”.

Suspected of being involved in the violence that targeted SOS Racisme activists during Eric Zemmour’s electoral meeting in Villepinte (Seine-Saint-Denis) last month, the group’s alleged leader, Marc de Cacqueray-Valmenier, was indicted for intentional violence in mid-December. This measure prohibited him from participating in these gatherings.

On December 5, in the middle of a speech by the far-right presidential candidate, several SOS Racisme activists who had shown “No to racism” T-shirts were victims of punches and chairs thrown by supporters of the speaker. Following this event, the small group was dissolved on January 5 in the Council of Ministers.

Before this action, the ZVPs had participated in the demonstration of December 1, 2018 of the Yellow Vests, the most violent and marked by the ransacking of the Arc de Triomphe.

The Zouaves, followers of flash actions like “hooligans”, defend “the concept of ‘white’ superiority”. The group was born from the gathering of former members of the Groupe union defense (GUD), the Bastion social and Génération identitaire, both dissolved.