Shifting a yellow vest protest falls short of obstruction

Filed 15h ago · Via Courthouse News · The Buffoon Desk

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News of Sorrow

Kevin MacLeod · incompetech.com · CC BY 4.0

Photo: mlewi18 · CC BY 2.0 · via Wikimedia Commons

The European Court of Human Rights ruled that France did not violate freedom of assembly when Paris police blocked yellow vest protesters from rallying beside the Élysée Palace in 2022, offering the larger Place de la République instead. Police cited a cramped site, online reach suggesting far more than the union's stated 50 participants, and injuries and arrests at four recent similar demonstrations.

The union argued the relocation, on top of a pattern of prior bans, effectively turned France's notification system into a permission system. Legal scholars quoted in the piece called the ruling a straightforward application of existing principles, while others noted the broader strain repeated bans place on organizers who must fight each one in emergency court.

The judgment isn't final; either side has three months to seek Grand Chamber review, which rarely happens.

The full dispatch is available from the source below.

✒ FROM THE EDITORIAL DESK

Offering a bigger square three times the size of the original spot and calling it a compromise is the kind of gesture that looks generous right up until you notice whose front lawn stayed off limits. The court found no violation here, fine, but the pattern described by the researchers, urgent overnight litigation just to stand somewhere with a sign, is not exactly a picture of a government eager to be seen. Nineteen rallies allowed is a fact; it doesn't erase the ones that weren't.

Source: Read the original at Courthouse News → Scored: News of Sorrow · Kevin MacLeod · CC BY 4.0

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