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Le Pen ups the
ante for May Day protests
01.05.2002 5.27 pm PARIS - In France, politics sometimes spills on to the streets, with unpredictable results. Even for France, this threatens to be an extraordinary � and potentially combustible � May Day. In Paris alone, there could be 300,000 demonstrators on the streets, extending from the most extreme fringes of the race-baiting far right to the most undemocratic shores of the sanctimonious and anarchic far left. Officially, both sides � supporters of Jean-Marie Le Pen, the National Front leader, on the one hand, and a broad swath of anti-Le Pen protesters on the other � will be kept apart, in place and time. Officially, the leaders of both sides are determined to avoid violence that could damage their cause when France votes in the second round of the presidential election on Sunday. Nevertheless police and leaders on both sides fear that breakaways from either march could cause mayhem in the centre of the capital, which will be largely closed for the 1 May public holiday. A splinter group of skinheads that detached itself from a similar National Front march on 1 May 1995 seized a young Moroccan passer-by, Brahim Bouraam, and drowned him in the Seine. More than 4,000 police have been mobilised today. There are particular concerns at the security problems posed by Mr Le Pen himself, who will lead the far-right march with his wife, Jany, and then speak for 90 minutes in the open air at the Place de l'Op�ra. Mr Le Pen's state bodyguard has been doubled. The Ministry of the Interior fears that there may be a temptation for "un illumin�" (a crazy person) to reverse the plot of The Day of the Jackal, the Frederick Forsyth thriller about a far-right plot to shoot Charles de Gaulle in Paris. Both of today's Paris marches were planned long before Mr Le Pen threw France into political crisis 10 days ago by taking second place in the first round of the presidential election, with just under 17 per cent of the vote. He is expected to lose the second round on Sunday to President Jacques Chirac by a wide margin. Each 1 May since 1988, Mr Le Pen has led a march through Paris, from Ch�telet to the Place de l'Opera, supposedly to mark Jeanne d'Arc (Joan of Arc) Day, which is actually 12 May. Normally he attracts 5,000 people; this year, he is forecasting 100,000 or more, including far-right delegations from other European countries and members of overtly neo-Nazi and anti-Semitic groups. Jeanne d'Arc, a peasant girl pure of heart and blood who tried to boot foreigners (the English) out of France, has been an icon of the French far right since the 1920s. She was a symbol for French anti-Semitic movements before being kidnapped by Mr Le Pen. The anti-Le Pen demonstration, expected to be 200,000 strong, has been grafted on to the annual May Day parade through Paris by trade unions and left-wing parties, from the Place de la R�publique to the Place de la Nation. There will be tens of thousands of young people from the spontaneous protests at schools and universities against the far-right, which have sprung up all over France in recent days. More menacingly, there will be far-left and anarchist groups and racially mixed bands of youths from the depressed inner suburbs of the capital. Similar anti-NF labour marches are planned in almost every French city or large town. THE END ==^================================================================ This email was sent to: [email protected] EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrHhl.bVKZIr Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ |
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