hundreds of ultra-right activists demonstrate in Paris in a tense climate

The administrative court on Saturday suspended the ban by the Paris police prefect on this ultra-right demonstration. It took place on Saturday afternoon in the capital without clashes but with many tensions with passers-by.

At least 600 ultra-right demonstrators in the heart of the capital. The annual demonstration organized by the “May 9 Committee”, in tribute to a former activist close to the GUD who died 30 years ago years, was able to take place on Saturday May 11 in Paris. It had been initially banned but the administrative court on Saturday suspended the ban by the Paris police prefect, considering that it was “a serious and manifestly illegal attack on the freedom to demonstrate”.

Dressed all in black, these activists advance calmly, in rows of four, their faces hidden under scarves. They shout the slogan of GUD, the ultra-right movement : “Europe! Youth! Revolution!” Anonymous people on the sidewalks get angry as they pass: “You’re nothing but fascists! Just fucking racists!” “You have no shame, you bunch of fascists! You are sullying France!”

Some come to blows, ultra-right activists are called upon to remain calm: “Keep the rows and columns!” Above all, you don’t want bad images. The security service prevents journalists from taking photos and videos by opening black umbrellas.

“No one will be able to silence us”

Distrust is required, explains a young woman with a sovereignist scarf over her nose: “The media and social networks try to hide all right-wing politics to make leftist propaganda. Just when you walk around the city, especially here in Paris, there are LGBT flags everywhere, there are stickers and LFI posters, etc. And no one will be able to silence us.”

Every year, the May 9 Committee organizes a parade at the beginning of May, in memory of Sébastien Deyzieu, a young activist from the Œuvre française, a far-right ultranationalist movement dissolved in 2013. He died in 1994 at the age aged 22 after slipping from a roof in the 6th arrondissement of Paris. He was trying to escape the police while participating in a demonstration “against American imperialism” which had been banned by the prefecture.

Along the way, people, at their windows or on their balconies, insult these ultra-right activists. And every time, they applaud. A young man makes a Nazi salute, neofascist references are numerous on t-shirts and tattoos. Faced with this procession led by Celtic crosses, passers-by wonder : should this demonstration really be authorized?