Activism

Rights groups accuse French police of brutality in pension protests

Criticism from human rights watchdogs mounted on Friday over the alleged brutality of French police in handling protests opposed to President Emmanuel Macron's pension reform.

French authorities arrested more than 450 people on Thursday in the most violent day of demonstrations since the start of the year against the bill to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64.

'Like an animal': Replica of Navalny's cell set up in Paris

A small concrete box marked with the word SHIZO (punishment cell in Russian) in giant red letters sits incongruously next to a 13th-century church just behind the Louvre museum in Paris.

The grey box is a mock-up of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny's punishment prison cell that his team unveiled in the French capital on March 14.

Police abuse reports

Minister of Citizens' Protection Takis Theodorikakos has ordered the immediate investigation into reports of police violence during a rally and protest march in Athens on Sunday over the deadly train accident at Tempe in central Greece last week. 

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