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Victim's family to boycott Hollande's Paris homage

The Local France
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Victim's family to boycott Hollande's Paris homage
The Hôtel des Invalides. Photo: Kenzo Tribouillard/AFP

President Francois Hollande called on Wednesday for French citizens to adorn their homes with flags during the day of mourning for victims of the Paris attacks, but the family of one victim has called for people to boycott this homage.

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Friday, 27th November will be a national day of homage to the 130 victims of  the Paris attacks.

And François Hollande wants the people of France to display their patriotism.

Citizens "could participate by decorating their homes with the blue, white and red flag," government spokesman Stephane Le Foll announced on Thursday.

Over one thousand family members of those who were killed and injured in the attacks have been invited to the Hôtel National des Invalides on the banks of the Seine in Paris.

Le Foll said that the aim of inviting the public to bedeck their houses in the national colours was “to allow everyone to participate in this event, in one way or another." He added that although not everyone could attend the ceremony in the Invalides, the government were aware that "there is a lot of emotion”.

But the family of one of the victims of the attacks is not happy with the idea, and has called for a public boycott of the homage.

Emmanuelle Prévost, whose brother was killed in the shootings at the Bataclan concert hall, took to Facebook to explain that she felt the government was partly responsible for the attacks.


(The Invalides, where the national homage will take place. Photo: AFP)

Prévost, who family is from Lambesart ,a town near Lille, outlined the reasons for her boycott in a post on her personal Facebook page and on the page ‘We miss you FX’, dedicated to her brother’s memory. 

“As the family of François-Xavier Prévost, victim of this slaughter, we will not participate,” wrote Prévost. “We refuse the hand extended by the political representatives of France.”

She then listed what she perceived to be the authorities’ errors of judgement and failures to prevent the attacks, that have been evoked by many in the aftermath of the November 13th bloodshed.

“In France, it is possible to have a link with a terrorist network, to go to Syria and to come back freely," she said.

Prévost said that the reason for her family's anger was the failure of the authorities to combat radicalism effectively. “Because in France, 89 mosques are listed as being radical... Because in France, a man who committed a murder in 2006, sentenced in 2008, was free in 2013,” she said, referring to Jawad Bendaoud, the man who rented an apartment in Saint-Denis to the terrorists.

Prévost referred to the killings at satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and a Jewish supermarket in January, saying: “Nothing was done and ten months later the same men were able to start again, killing ten times as many people.”

“No thank you Mr President. Your extended hand, your homage, we don’t want it and you are partly responsible for what has happened to us. It was necessary to act earlier. The attacks in January should have been enough!”

She concluded her message by asking others to join her in the boycott.

First published on November 23rd, the post has been shared almost 17,000 times.

Among those who have commented on the message the French MP and Mayor of Lambesart, Marc-Philippe Daubresse, who has also pointed the finger of blame at the government.

“Eleventh months of losses, I’m angry. We can’t stop ourselves asking how many lives could have been saved if the public powers had acted earlier," he said.
 

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