French police accused over migrant eviction
- 14 years ago
A disturbing video showing French police roughly handling immigrants of African descent is causing an uproar in France.
The video, shot on July 21st shows police dragging away women of African origin who were demonstrating against their eviction from a block of flats where they were living.
A housing campaigner filmed the scenes which show a mother apparently being dragged on the floor with her baby on her back.
Other scenes show a pregnant woman lying apparently unconscious on the ground.
The website which published the video, Mediapart.fr, had almost 500,000 hits by Sunday.
Police authorities issued a statement after the video was released saying police had used normal force in this kind of situation.
The families had set up camp in front of the flats from which they were expelled in early July this year.