They now know they are threatened with dissolution, accused by Gérald Darmanin of calling “for an uprising. “But so far, they have received” no mail for a real procedure “and therefore have” no idea of the motivations for this possible dissolution or the entity that would be targeted. In a press release published this Tuesday on social networks, the Rennes ultra-left group Défense collective reacted to the remarks made on Sunday in the JDD by the Minister of the Interior.
Presenting itself as “an open and public group” which fights “against police and judicial repression”, the DefCo movement considers first of all that “the timing of this announcement” is “far from being trivial. “In this sequence of social conflict where police and judicial repression reached new heights, and where the management of the social movement by the State suffered an unprecedented wave of criticism, the authorities now seem to be expressing their desire to attack the collectives of legal support and assistance to the demonstrators targeted by the repression”, he indicates.
Pointing to the “repressive frenzy” of the Government, he also believes that this threat of dissolution constitutes an “unprecedented and serious attack on the right to defense in the midst of a social movement. »
“The intention to fiercely defend ourselves”
Appeared in 2016 in the Breton capital in the wake of demonstrations against the Labor Law, the group, which has been particularly active since the beginning of the mobilization against the pension reform, regularly posts legal advice on social networks for people arrested during the demonstrations. or calling for rallies in support of the charged individuals. Its members also claim “an active presence in the street” and assume “practices of defending processions in the face of repression. But the collective denies being “responsible for social protest and the anti-fascist struggle in Rennes. »
While waiting to learn more about his fate, Collective Defense assures that “no matter what happens next, the fight will continue. “It goes without saying that we intend to fiercely defend ourselves against this procedure if it were to materialize,” the statement concluded.