Emmanuel Macron condemns racism but rules out removal of contested statues

&Tab;&Tab;<div class&equals;"wpcnt">&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;<div class&equals;"wpa">&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;<span class&equals;"wpa-about">Advertisements<&sol;span>&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;<div class&equals;"u top&lowbar;amp">&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;<amp-ad width&equals;"300" height&equals;"265"&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab; type&equals;"pubmine"&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab; data-siteid&equals;"111265417"&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab; data-section&equals;"1">&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab;<&sol;amp-ad>&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;<&sol;div>&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;<&sol;div>&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab;<&sol;div><p>French President Emmanuel Macron has vowed to stand firm against racism but also praised police and insisted that France would not take down statues of controversial&comma; colonial-era figures&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>It was the first time Mr Macron has spoken on the issues since George Floyd’s death in the US unleashed protests around the world&comma; including several in France&comma; where demonstrators have expressed anger at racial injustice and police brutality&comma; particularly toward minorities from France’s former colonies in Africa&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Unusually for a French leader&comma; Mr Macron acknowledged that someone’s &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;address&comma; name&comma; colour of skin” can reduce their chances at succeeding in French society&comma; and called for a fight to ensure that everyone can &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;find their place” regardless of ethnic origin or religion&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>He promised to be &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;uncompromising in the face of racism&comma; anti-Semitism and discrimination”&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>However&comma; he insisted that France will not take down statues of controversial&comma; colonial-era figures as has happened in some other countries in recent weeks&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Amid calls for taking down statues tied to France’s slave trade or colonial wrongs&comma; Mr Macron said &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;the republic will not erase any trace&comma; or any name&comma; from its history … it will not take down any statue”&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><i>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;We should look at all of our history together” including relations with Africa&comma; with a goal of &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;truth” instead of &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;denying who we are”<&sol;i>&comma; Mr Macron said&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>He did not address accusations of police violence but said forces of order deserve &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;the nation’s recognition”&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Mr Macron also announced that France will reopen nearly everything starting Monday after three months of virus confinement measures&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The president promised an internal audit into how his administration handled the virus&comma; notably compared to other countries like Germany&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>That was in addition to a parliamentary inquiry already under way&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Despite having one of the world’s best health care systems&comma; France was dangerously short of all kinds of masks and testing capacity as coronavirus patients overwhelmed intensive care wards in March&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>More than 80 lawsuits have been filed accusing his government of manslaughter&comma; neglect or otherwise mishandling the virus crisis&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Mr Macron sent in the army to help and ordered strict lockdown measures that slowed the spread&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>But nearly 30&comma;000 people have died&comma; about half of them in nursing homes&comma; and more than 150&comma;000 have been infected&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>More than 200 new virus clusters have emerged since France started reopening May 11&comma; according to the national health agency&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Meanwhile&comma; his government is facing growing pressure to confront racism and police violence&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>At least 15&comma;000 people demonstrated in Paris on Saturday&comma; the latest in a string of French protests galvanised by George Floyd’s death in the US and the Black Lives Matter movement&comma; but increasingly focused on France’s own tensions between police and minorities&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>In response&comma; the government banned police chokeholds and vowed to stamp out racism among police — but that has now angered police unions&comma; who say they’re being unfairly painted as white supremacists and staged protests of their own&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Calls are also mounting to reassess France’s colonial legacy&comma; causing division within Mr Macron’s own camp&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Over the past two days&comma; the culture minister denounced the decision to cancel a Paris showing of Gone With The Wind&comma; a film long criticised as romanticising slavery&comma; as contrary to freedom of expression&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>And he firmly condemned activists who tried to take a piece of African art from a Paris museum dedicated to artwork from former colonies&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>But government minister Sibeth Ndiaye&comma; a close Macron ally and the most prominent black figure in current French politics&comma; wrote an unusually personal essay Saturday in Le Monde calling for France to rethink its colour-blind doctrine&comma; which aims at encouraging equality by ignoring race altogether&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;<i>We must not hesitate to name things&comma; to say that a skin colour is not neutral&comma;<&sol;i>” she wrote&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>She called on the French to &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;<i>confront our memories<&sol;i>” about their history and find a &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;<i>shared narrative<&sol;i>” with former colonies&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Mr Macron’s office firmly denied a report last week that he was considering resigning and calling a snap election&comma; but the rumour reflected the gravity of the French mood&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>A new forecast last week from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development showed France’s economy will suffer more than most from the coming recession — and is not expected to improve much by the next presidential election in 2022&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The economy is expected to shrink at least 11&percnt; percent this year&comma; pushing many out of work and torpedoing Macron’s goals of bringing down unemployment&comma; rehauling the retirement system and making France more globally competitive&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;<div style&equals;"padding-bottom&colon;15px&semi;" class&equals;"wordads-tag" data-slot-type&equals;"belowpost">&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;<div id&equals;"atatags-dynamic-belowpost-68e34f7905be1">&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;<script type&equals;"text&sol;javascript">&NewLine;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;&Tab;window&period;getAdSnippetCallback &equals; 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