French ‘ultra-left’ behind killing of right-wing youth: justice minister

France's Justice minister Gerald Darmanin looks on as he leaves the weekly cabinet meeting, Feb. 19, 2025 at the Elysee Palace in Paris. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus, File)

The “ultra-left” in France was behind the deadly beating of a French youth aligned with the far right whose death has inflamed political tensions in the country, the justice minister said on Sunday.

Gerald Darmanin also accused hard-left politicians, including from the France Unbowed (LFI) party, the largest left-wing faction in parliament, of fuelling violence with their language.

The victim, identified only as Quentin, aged 23, had been hospitalized and placed into a coma on Thursday after being attacked in the southeastern city of Lyon.

Supporters said he was providing security at a protest against an appearance by Rima Hassan, an LFI member of the European Parliament, at the Lyon branch of the Sciences Po university when he was assaulted by a gang of rival activists.

The office of the Lyon prosecutor on Saturday told AFP he had died of his wounds. An investigation has been opened into suspected aggravated manslaughter, it added.

“It was clearly the ultra left that killed him,” Darmanin told RTL television.

“There are indeed speeches, particularly from France Unbowed and the ultra-left, which unfortunately lead to unbridled violence on social networks and then in the physical world,” he said.

“Words can kill,” Darmanin added, accusing Hassan and LFI leader Jean-Luc Melenchon of “not having a word to say for the family of the young man”.

Calls for calm

Lyon prosecutors have yet to give details on the circumstances of the killing.

According to the Nemesis collective, which is close to the far right, Quentin was providing security for its protesters and was assaulted by “anti-fascist” activists.

The family’s lawyer said in a statement that Quentin appeared to have been ambushed by “organized and trained individuals, vastly superior in number and armed, some with their faces masked”.

LFI lawmaker Eric Coquerel, speaking to Franceinfo, condemned “all political violence” but said the activists responsible for Hassan’s security “were in no way involved in what happened”.

He pointed instead to a particular “context” in the southeastern city marked by violence from “far-right groups”.

Three-time presidential candidate Marine Le Pen, who is still hoping to stand in 2027 despite a graft conviction, said on X that the “barbarians responsible for this lynching” should be brought to justice.

With tensions between France’s far right and hard left intensifying ahead of the 2027 presidential election, centrist President Emmanuel Macron has called for “calm” and “restraint”.