Europe

France moves to ban police chokeholds amid global George Floyd protests

French police will end the use of chokeholds amid international protests over the death of George Floyd.

In France, “[t]he method of seizing the neck via strangling will be abandoned and will no longer be taught in police schools,” Interior Minister Christopher Castaner said in a statement Monday, according to The Associated Press, adding “it will be now forbidden to push on the back of the neck or the neck.”

Floyd died May 25 after then-officer Derek Chauvin kept his knee on Floyd’s neck for more than eight minutes. Chauvin faces charges of second-degree murder as well as third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter, according to the wire service.

Paris police made an arrest that has drawn similar comparisons three days later, when an officer pinned a black man with his knee and shin on the man’s jaw, neck and upper chest, according to the AP.

Police use of chokeholds have been a flashpoint for the protests sweeping the country and the world after Floyd’s death.

French President Emmanuel Macron’s office said he spoke to top officials and told Castaner to fast-track previously promised police reforms.

French activists are similarly concerned that tensions in largely nonwhite neighborhoods between civilians and police have been exacerbated during the coronavirus lockdown period.

A march in the western French city of Nantes took place Monday, with demonstrators planning further protests Tuesday.