Twenty four organisations have called on France to end the discriminatory police checks and fines. Failure to respect lockdown rules can result in a fine of 135 EUR with repeated breaches punishable by up to six months in prison of a fine of 3750 EUR. Since the beginning of the lockdown police has been shown to enforce the restrictions with abusive, violent and discriminatory police stops, sometimes accompanied by racist insults. 

Official data also show a considerable concentration of police stops in predominantly working-class neighbourhoods with high number of minority residents. The letter addressed to the French Government notes that, for example, in Seine-Saint-Denis, the poorest neighbourhood of Metropolitan France, fine rate was three times higher than national average, revealing a longstanding and well-documented discriminatory police practices against the residents of “quartiers populaires.” (working-class neighborhoods with a high number of visible minority residents)

Read the letter in French.

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