Anti-racism groups in Paris call out slave trader statues

Anti-racism groups are leing a “de-colonial tour” of Paris on Sunday to call attention to monuments and streets horing historical figures tied to slave tre or colonial-era abuses.

march, starting at French capital’s Museum of Immigration, is being held on 58th anniversary of Algeria’s independence from France after a long and brutal war.

It’s organized by a group representing low-income neighborhoods in French suburbs that are home to large communities who trace ir origins to former colonies. Black activists and migrants’ rights groups are also joining.

While statues have fallen across U.S. and in some or European countries amid global anti-racism movement following George Floyd’s death by police on May 25, response to such monuments in France so far has been more muted.

Scattered statues have been covered with graffiti, but French President Emmanuel Macron has insisted that authorities will t remove any controversial monuments , as has happened in or countries.

In a call on social networks, organizers of Sunday’s march accused government of “igring memory of peoples it reduced to slavery or colonized by mass slaughter.” y want France to rename streets and monuments for people who fought against slave tring and colonial crimes.

Algeria was considered jewel in France’s colonial empire, and is marking its independence day Sunday with a special funeral ceremony for 24 resistance fighters decapitated by French forces in 19th century.

fighters’ skulls were brought back to France as trophies and held in a Paris museum for deces until ir return to Algiers on Friday.