France pinned at the UN for racial discrimination and police violence

Attacks on migrants, racial profiling, police violence… France is the target of criticism at the UN which was examining the human rights situation in the country on Monday May 1. The Human Rights Council focused for more than three hours on the human rights situation in France, a procedure to which all member states of the United Nations regularly submit.

A large number of countries, including the United States and Tunisia, have called on France to step up its efforts to combat violence and racial discrimination. “We recommend that France intensify its efforts to combat crimes and threats of violence motivated by religious hatred such as anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim hatred,” said US Representative Kelly Billingsley.

“There is an increase in racism”

“There is an increase in racism and xenophobia”, accused the Chinese representative, who called on France to stop taking “measures that violate the rights of migrants”. Brazil and Japan criticized “racial profiling by the security forces”, while South Africa called on the French authorities “to take steps to ensure impartial investigations by bodies outside the police into all cases of racist incidents involving police officers”.

Russia, Venezuela and Iran, three countries whose serious human rights violations are regularly condemned by the UN and NGOs, have also chosen to criticize police violence in particular.

During the response session of the French delegation, Sabrine Balim, legal adviser to the Ministry of the Interior, argued that “the use of force is strictly supervised, controlled and, in the event of fault, sanctioned”. In addition, she recalled that the police had an obligation to wear an individual identification number “in order to ensure visibility and traceability of their actions”.