PARIS, 1 December 2020, (Media Report): Four French police officers have been charged on Monday over the beating and racial abuse of a Black music producer, a case that has outraged France and ramped up pressure on the government to give ground on a controversial security bill. 

The assault of Michel Zecler exposed in video footage published last week has become a new rallying cause for critics who accuse the police of institutionalized racism and brutality. 

President Emmanuel Macron summoned cabinet ministers and parliamentary leaders to a crisis meeting on Monday to rapidly produce “suggestions to re-establish confidence” between the police and the population, government sources said. 

Later, on Monday, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin is to face questions from a parliamentary commission over the new security law, which would restrict the right of the press – and of social media users – to publish images of on-duty police. 

The bill would criminalize publishing images of on-duty police with the intent of harming their “physical or psychological integrity”. It was passed by the National Assembly this month, though it still requires approval from the Senate. 

Rallies against the law mobilized tens of thousands of protesters at the weekend, with dozens wounded during clashes with police in Paris.  

A Paris investigating magistrate early on Monday charged all four officers with assault by a person holding public authority. Three were also charged with fabricating their statement on the incident. 

Critics say the legislation is further evidence of a slide to the right by Macron, who came to power in 2017 as a centrist promising a liberal overhaul of France. 

The president “is caught in a trap,” said the headline in the left-leaning Liberation daily. “The government prefers to let the situation decay rather than withdraw Article 24.” 

The protests in Paris saw a brasserie set alight, cars torched and stones thrown at security forces, who responded with tear gas and anti-riot tactics.