French anti-terrorism police have joined the criminal investigation into the alleged Antifa mob killing of a conservative student at a Lyon university last month.
Two more men were arrested on Wednesday on suspicion of involvement in the killing of 23-year-old mathematics student Quentin Deranque, who was beaten to death last month on the sidelines of a feminist anti-mass migration protest on the Sciences Po university campus in Lyon.
This comes on top of the initial wave of 11 arrests, seven of whom have been charged for involvement in the actual beating, and another four on suspicion of having aided those who took part in the violence evade justice.
The two men arrested this week, aged 23 and 26, were detained by the Rhône Territorial Crime Directorate (DCT).
However, citing police sources, Le Figaro reported that the investigation into the pair was conducted in conjunction with the Anti-Terrorist Sub-Directorate (SDAT).
According to the paper, the anti-terror police force joined the investigation over the case’s “connections within far-left circles.”
Previous reports have claimed that multiple suspects allegedly involved in the killing were members of the Lyon-based Antifa cell, the Jeune Garde (Young Guard), founded by far-left La France Insoumise (LFI/France in Rebellion) MP Raphaël Arnault.
Sensationally, two of those suspected in the killing of Deranque worked for Arnault in the French National Assembly parliament up until last month, thereby apparently directly tying the LFI party of radical left leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon to far-left street violence.
While the Young Guard was banned by the French government last year, for multiple supposed ex-members of the group to have been organised on the Sciences Po campus during the killing suggests that the ban was not effective in preventing its activities.
For anti-terror police to be investigating the Antifa cell will likely put more scrutiny on Mélenchon’s decision openly defend the Young Guard after its ban last year.
It will also highlight the Mélenchonist LFI party’s decision to nominate Arnault as a candidate to the National Assembly in 2024, despite it becoming public knowledge beforehand that he had an “S-File”, meaning that he was on the government watch list for extremism.
Yet the far-left party has so far refused to bend to political pressure to remove Arnault from the party and has instead continued to defend Arnault as an exemplary “comrade”.
The case has spurred calls, from figures such as French National Rally leader Marine Le Pen and Alternative for Germany leader Alice Weidel, for Europe to follow U.S. President Donald Trump’s lead in classifying Antifa as a terrorist organisation.
It is also likely to be a major factor in this month’s municipal elections in France and may influence next year’s presidential election to replace Emmanuel Macron.
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