(Ligue des Droits de l’Homme / Translated from French) The Law on Public Security of 30 October 2017, which succeeded the exceptional regime of the state of emergency, was examined by the Constitutional Court under the initiative of the League of Human Rights (LDH). LDH had filed to the Court four priority issues of constitutionality (QPC).
The decision came a few days after the deadly terrorist attacks in Carcassonne and Trèbes and confirmed a dangerous tendency to weaken justice and liberty by endorsing measures of generalised suspicion and the primacy of the administrative police in the fight against terrorism, despite the dubious results.
LDH highlights the seriousness about the warnings of the risks of abuse, stigmatisation and arbitrariness, that the Court pointed out. Therefore, it welcomes the firm reminder of the principle of non-discrimination of identity checks within the security boundaries decided based on the goodwill of prefects alone. It notes with satisfaction the requirement of supervision by judicial police officers on private security agents working within these limits, such as the limitation of time for house arrest, now renamed “individual measures of control and surveillance”.
LDH will be very vigilant to the proper application of these measures by the gradual implementation – together with its territorial sections – of local observatories of rights and freedoms, in line with its legal and reception offices for victims of discrimination.
Created precisely 120 years ago with the Dreyfus case against the arbitrariness of the State, LDH will tirelessly pursue its pedagogical work on the implementation of these measures, to denounce abuses and to help all those suffering a violation of their rights. Worried about current excesses and misconducts, it reaffirms that the fight against terrorism is effective only in respect of equal rights for all, regardless of origin or religion, except to proven enemies of democracy.
Featured image: Charles Platiau via REUTERS