Saturday, January 7, the Yellow Vests found the cobblestones for a new mobilization against the future pension reform, inflation and for an overhaul of institutions. Since then, a video has been circulating very virally on social networks: that of Philippe Murer, an economist close to the sovereignists. The latter would have been prevented from entering the demonstration because of the French flag which he then carried in his right hand.
“Why can’t he pass?” Because it has the French flag? It’s incredible ! “, accuses the woman behind the video, journalist Myriam Palomba. In the video, we also hear Philippe Murer explain that the gendarme would have asked him to put down his French flag. “We are there to represent the French people, whose emblem is the flag and we do not have the right to pass”, he is indignant.
This Monday, Philippe Murer was also on the air of Radio courtesy to come back to this altercation with the gendarmes: “I was at the demonstration and I wanted to join a journalist on a lawn right next door”, he summarized . “The policeman refused, telling me: ‘You can pass but if you throw your French flag behind.’ […] I do not want to say bad things about this policeman, they systematically act on the orders of the Ministry of the Interior in demonstration”. However, the Paris police headquarters explains to 20 minutes that no such rule had been required.
FAKE OFF
What happened on the lawn before the launch of the event? Contacted by 20 minutesthe Paris police headquarters [l’institution en charge de la sécurité des manifestations] claims never to have demanded such a rule.
“At the time of the implementation of the device by the police, before the departure of the procession, a participant carrying the French flag was momentarily stopped in his crossing of the median”, confirms the prefecture. However, Philippe Murer would never have been turned back for the reasons he affirms. “This instruction was given so that the procession could be formed and set off. No instructions have been passed for the carrying of the flag”.
Visible tricolor flags
Moreover, as the prefecture affirms, flags are well authorized and it is easy to find them throughout the demonstrations, as this video of the overview of the procession shows for example.
Other photographs also show French flags in the crowd of demonstrators and visible to the police (in this case the CRS in the foreground).
A surfer also claims that the Elysee Palace immediately recognized that the French flag of Philippe Murer had been confused by a Russian flag. However, no communication has been made to this effect and according to the statements of the Prefecture, this allegation is very unlikely.