June 6, 2013

The Partido de Trabajadores Socialistas expresses its absolute condemnation to the killing of Clément Méric, a student at Sciences Po in Paris and an activist of the Action Antifasciste Paris-Banlieue and of the trade union SUD-Solidaires at the Sciences-Po. Clement, who was brutally attacked and beaten by skinheads of the far-right group Jeunesses Nationalistes Révolutionnaires (JNR) near the Saint Lazare station in Paris, died at the hospital after being declared brain dead.

Today all our thoughts are with his family and his comrades-students and fellow activists. We express our solidarity to all of them and call for the broadest possible mobilization to stop these far right groups and demand the punishment for those responsible of this brutal attack.

Against the backdrop of the capitalist crisis, this attack is inseparable from the surge of right-wing extremists in in Europe, like Golden Dawn in Greece, Ukip in Britain and the National Front in France. These far-right groups exacerbate xenophobia, racism and homophobia and are prepared to act as a ‘violent groups of action’ when the workers and the poor are mobilised. In France, these groups follow and beat immigrants, resulting in an increasing of the “securitas” (security forces) on the streets. These far-right groups have become bolder following the reactionary political climate around the legalization of same-sex marriage in the country.

This surge of the right-wing extremists is the result of a climate of hatred spread by the anti-immigrant and discriminatory policies implemented by the EU and carried out by the traditional political parties, whether they are social democrats or conservatives.

On the face of these attacks we vindicate the right to self-defence, which should be organized by workers’ organisations and the left. The only way to clamp down these far-right groups is to outnumber them on the streets organising workers and students in the broadest mobilization.

Translated by Alejandra Ríos