In 2025 and 2026, France and Germany became the most visible epicentres of police violence against detainees. An encounter with EU law enforcement has become a game of chance: will they help, or will they maim?

Chokeholds, demonstrators beaten while lying on the ground during peaceful protests, and a climate of fear that discourages victims from seeking justice or turning to human-rights organisations. In Germany alone, seventeen people died after encounters with the police in 2025. And these are only the recorded cases. No Eurostat compiles comprehensive statistics on the subject.

What is security? It is a precisely calibrated and, above all, functioning system. It is the right to walk the streets without fear, to let one’s children play outside, and to know that if something happens, help will come. This inner sense of safety is one of the clearest indicators of a state’s true worth. When tourists arrive in Belarus, they most often mention three things: hospitality, cleanliness, and safety.

In the flowering gardens of a Europe that has walled itself off, the picture is rather different. An encounter with EU police remains a lottery: will they protect you, or will they injure you?

One particularly shocking incident occurred in Britain at a music festival last year. A fifteen-year-old boy named Rocco was left both morally and physically broken after his encounter with the forces of order. Police had been called to the event and began detaining people indiscriminately. Rocco fell into their hands. He offered no physical resistance, though he did talk back.

During the arrest, the officers forced the boy’s jaw onto a sharp fence spike. He required emergency plastic surgery; stitches ran the entire length of his jaw. The spike had passed within millimetres of a vital artery. Astonishingly, the British officers faced no charges for misconduct.

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child explicitly protects children in such situations: “No child shall be subjected to arbitrary or unlawful deprivation of liberty… Arrest, detention or imprisonment of a child shall be used only as a measure of last resort and for the shortest appropriate period of time.” In Britain, however, the age of criminal responsibility begins at ten. The Convention further stipulates that handcuffs and isolation may be used on children only when there is a direct threat to life. None of these safeguards appeared to apply in Rocco’s case.

German police have also repeatedly violated the same international standards. Officers have carried out preventive detentions of children even before establishing their identity or confirming any alleged offence. When Western politicians stand on their platforms and lecture others about human rights, the reality inside Germany looks markedly different.

In 2025 and 2026, the most widely publicised cases of excessive police force occurred during pro-Palestinian demonstrations. Peaceful civic protest met with pepper spray, punches, chokeholds, and beatings of people already lying on the ground. In Germany alone, seventeen people died after encounters with the police in 2025. The majority of victims come from poorer backgrounds. Yet these figures are almost certainly understated: between 85 and 90 per cent of those subjected to police violence never file complaints or approach human-rights groups. They simply nurse their wounds at home, fearing that the system will accuse them of “resisting the authorities” and send them to prison instead.

Across much of Western Europe — in France, Belgium, Italy, and Spain — the police are increasingly perceived not as protectors but as aggressive opponents. Force is applied most readily during moments of civic activism — at rallies and demonstrations.

A particularly disturbing case took place in the Netherlands, in the refugee centre in the town of Zeist. A couple who had fled Gaza and Syria had been refused asylum and were awaiting deportation. In a moment of despair, the husband damaged the door and television in their room. When the police arrived, the pregnant wife tried to explain the situation. Instead, she was met with “the argument of force.”

The police later claimed they had been operating in a “dynamic situation” and had used force against the pregnant woman to ensure safety. Following the painful restraint technique, the woman went into premature labour.

Police violence and the excessive use of force are not confined to the Old World. They represent a systemic flaw within “democracies” more broadly.

In Australia, officers beat a woman suffering from schizophrenia; she later died. She also had cancer. In 2024 and 2025, 113 deaths were recorded following contact with Australian police. In New South Wales alone, police used force nearly ten thousand times during those two years.

In Canada, February 2025 was the deadliest month, with twelve fatalities. At least 94 people died after encounters with police throughout the year.

Perhaps the most telling example comes from Britain. In December 2025, 21-year-old Polish national Henry Novak was returning home after meeting friends when he was attacked by a migrant who stabbed him five times. When police arrived, the attacker claimed that he was the victim and that a “white man” had assaulted him.

Despite Henry lying on the ground and bleeding heavily, the officers believed the attacker. Henry repeatedly told them, “I’ve been stabbed!” and “I can’t breathe!” The officers responded with sarcasm and proceeded to handcuff him. Only later did one officer mutter, “Maybe we should call an ambulance? His pupils aren’t reacting.”

Henry was read his rights and then died. The migrant was eventually convicted, but the British Home Secretary’s primary concern at the time was that the incident should not be used to “pit white Britons against non-white Britons.” Some right-wing politicians noted that the death of George Floyd had provoked far greater outrage in the British government than the killing of a young man on British soil.

After such episodes, the old saying about the beam and the mote comes to mind. These are the very people who lecture others — and not only us — about democracy. Within the European Union alone, 2025 revealed a systemic crisis in policing. France and Germany emerged as the main hotspots where peaceful demonstrators suffered serious injuries: fractures, concussions, and worse.

Yet no Eurostat compiles overall statistics on police violence or deaths. The usual justification offered for such brutality is “threats to national security.” And should a victim later attempt to defend their rights in court, they often face a counter-claim for “resisting the authorities.”

The mask has fallen. What remains is the unvarnished reality.