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A French prosecutor is seeking murder charges against seven suspects in the fatal beating of a far-right activist that has fuelled political anger beyond France’s borders, prompting Emmanuel Macron to tell Italy’s Giorgia Meloni to keep out of French affairs.
Quentin Deranque, 23, died from head injuries after being attacked by at least six people on the sidelines of a far-right protest in Lyon on 12 February. Most of the 11 suspects who have been detained are from far-left movements.
The prosecutor Thierry Dran told a press conference he had requested murder charges against seven men and recommended they remain in custody to avoid any “disturbance to public order”.
The killing has fuelled political tensions before French municipal elections in March and the 2027 presidential race, in which the far-right National Rally party is expected to have its best chance yet of winning the highest office.
On Wednesday, Meloni said the killing of Deranque was “a wound for all of Europe”.
Macron said there was no place in France “for movements that adopt and legitimise violence” and he called on all political parties to “clean up” their act. “Nothing can justify violent action – neither on one side nor the other, and not even in a head-to-head confrontation that is deadly for the republic,” he said.
Macron also suggested that people should “stay in their own lane”, after Meloni lamented “a climate of ideological hatred”.
“I’m always struck by the fact that people who are nationalists – who don’t want anyone bothering them at home – are always the first to comment on what is happening elsewhere,” Macron said while on a visit to Delhi.
Italy’s foreign minister, Antonio Tajani, hit back, saying the killing of the French activist was “a serious matter that concerns us all”. Tajani said on X that there had been similar incidents in Italy’s history and that condemning such violence aimed “to ensure that we do not return to a terrible past”.
He said there had been “many Quentins in Italy, some during the darkest periods of the republic”.
Macron was “closely monitoring” events, a member of his team said on Thursday, adding: “We must avoid any spiral of violence.”
Eleven people – eight men and three women – were taken into custody over the killing. Dran said that of the seven men who could be charged with homicide, two had refused to speak while in custody.
He said others acknowledged being at the scene and “some admit to having struck blows” but they had all disputed having had any homicidal intent. Four suspects had been released but more were being sought, he added.
Among those originally detained are two parliamentary assistants to Raphaël Arnault, a MP with the hard-left France Unbowed (LFI) party, as well as a former intern.
A lawyer for Deranque’s parents said they called “for calm and restraint”. “The family condemns any call for violence. Any form of political violence,” Fabien Rajon told the broadcaster RTL.
In snap parliamentary polls in 2024, Macron’s supporters and the left, including the hard left, joined forces in an effort to bar the far right from power. But after Deranque’s killing, some high-profile politicians have sought to distance themselves from the hard left, ruling out any possible future alliance.
The justice minister, Gérald Darmanin, called on Arnault to “draw the consequences” if the judiciary “finds serious and consistent evidence concerning him or the aides he hired”.
LFI’s national coordinator, Manuel Bompard, said Arnault would “certainly not” be suspended or excluded from the LFI group in the national assembly’s lower house.
An anti-immigration collective called Nemesis has blamed the killing of the activist on an anti-fascist youth group called La Jeune Garde (Young Guard) that was co-founded by Arnault before he was elected to parliament.
