Nanterre, France. A year after a French teenager of North African origin was killed by the police — a shooting that sparked shock and days of unrest across France — his mother led a silent march Saturday to pay tribute to her son.
It comes at a politically tense time. hate speech is ruining the campaign for early parliamentary elections this weekend, and an anti-immigration party that wants to increase police gun powers and has historical links to racism and anti-Semitism is leading the polls.
Several hundred family members, friends and supporters gathered in the Paris suburb of Nanterre to remember 17-year-old Nahel Merzouk, who was shot dead at point-blank range by a police officer at a traffic stop on June 27, 2023.
Within hours of his death, Merzouk, a delivery driver from a working-class neighborhood, became a symbol. For many across France, he was the embodiment of young black and North African French people who, studies show, face police controls and discrimination more frequently than their white counterparts.
“My son was executed,” his mother Mounia told the crowd. “When I come home there is no one. I don’t have my baby anymore. When I go to her room, she is empty.” She expressed fear of meeting the police officer who killed her son and that he has been released pending further investigation.
Her friends wore white T-shirts with Merzouk’s photo and other residents of her housing complex held a banner that read “Justice for Nahel.” The march ended at the spot where he was murdered and an imam sang and read a prayer.
There was no visible police presence, although march organizers recruited guards to ensure the security of the event. Merzouk’s mother asked politicians to stay away to avoid politicking or tensions the day before The French parliamentary elections
On Sunday, French voters will vote in the first round of early elections for the National Assembly, the lower house of parliament, which could lead to the country’s first far-right government since the Nazi occupation of World War II.
French opinion polls suggest the National Rally party could dominate the next parliament after the July 7 runoff and win the prime minister’s job. In that scenario, centrist President Emmanuel Macron would retain the presidency until 2027, but in a very weakened role.
“This march that is happening now is a powerful symbol,” said Assa Traore, who has been fighting for justice since his brother Adama died in French police custody in 2016.
“It means that history cannot write itself without us. We, those of the working-class neighborhoods, are the first-hand victims of these elections,” said this 39-year-old man of Malian origin who marched with Merzouk’s family. “We… are afraid every day that our sons, brothers, or husbands will be killed. Racism and racial discrimination are our daily lives.”
Merzouk’s death, which was captured on video, stirred up long-simmering tensions between police and young people in housing projects and disadvantaged suburbs, many of whom are young people born in France with immigrant family backgrounds. Fueled by TikTok, the riots spread at unprecedented speed before a massive police crackdown. The riots caused, according to French authorities, more than $1 billion in damage.
The officer who fired claimed self-defense, and a far-right figure launched a crowdfunding campaign for the police officer who raised $1.6 million before being shut down.
Citing security concerns, especially in impoverished areas of the French banlieues, the far-right National Rally wants to give a specific new legal status to the police. If police officers use their weapons during an intervention, they will be presumed to have acted in self-defense. Currently, police officers have the same legal status as all French citizens and must prove that they acted in self-defense.
Meanwhile, the leftist New Popular Front coalition wants to ban the use of some police weapons and dismantle a notoriously tough police unit.
Among those who marched on Sunday was Lina Marsouk, a 15-year-old student from Nanterre who described watching relatives suffer brutal police checks. “These scenes have traumatized me,” she said.
Born and raised in France and with Algerian roots, she also described being told to “go back to your country” while visiting nearby Paris.
“I’ve always lived here,” he said. “These comments are hurtful. “I feel sad and disappointed that France has taken this path.”
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Associated Press writer Angela Charlton in Paris contributed.
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