China urges France to protect its citizens after police in Paris kill Chinese father of five, sparking protests
China has called on France to better protect the “security and rights” of its citizens after police shot dead a father of five at his home in Paris, sparking riots in which 35 people were arrested and three officers hurt.
Hundreds of members of the Asian community and supporters of anti-racism groups gathered outside a police station in the northeast of the capital on Tuesday to protest against the killing of Shaoyo Liu.
The 56-year-old Chinese was killed on Sunday at his home in front of his five children.
A police source told AFP that officers were called to his house after reports of a domestic dispute.
The source said the man attacked the officer with a knife “as soon as the door opened”, injuring him.
A police colleague then opened fire, killing the Chinese man, authorities say.
Lawyer Calvin Job said the family of the dead man “totally disputes this version of events.”
“He didn’t injure anyone,” Job said, adding that the man had been “trimming fish with a pair of scissors” when the police came to the door, AFP reports.
China has issued an “official complaint” to French embassy officials in Beijing over the incident, according to a Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying, who called for authorities “get to the bottom of the incident as soon as possible”.
France must protect the “security and rights” of Chinese citizens, she added. Calling for calm, she said: “We hope that our compatriots in France will make their complaints known in a reasonable and legal manner.”
Newly appointed French Interior Minister Matthias Fekl condemned the violence at the protest and said the security forces had his “full support”.
He called for calm “to allow the judicial process under way to proceed in an orderly fashion”.
The protest came just days after several thousand people marched in Paris against police violence, in a show of anger sparked by the alleged rape in February of a young black man with a police baton, the Telegraph reports.
