PARIS (FRANCE) – Barely a week after the beheading of a French schoolteacher Samuel Paty, which rocked the country, a mayor has received threats of decapitation.
“These threats must be taken seriously,” said Jeremie Breaud, the mayor of Bron near the major city of Lyon, on BFM TV on Friday, adding that offers of police protection have also come.
Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin tweeted his support for the mayor and said police protection would be given.
On his Twitter handle, Breaud posted a photo of graffiti on a wall in the town saying “Jeremy Breaud, we will cut your head off”. Police have launched a probe.
Paty was beheaded on Oct. 16 outside his school in a middle-class Parisian suburb in broad daylight by an 18-year-old man of Chechen origin, who was gunned down by police.
He had sought to avenge the teacher’s use of caricatures depicting Prophet Mohammed in a class on freedom of expression. This is considered to be blasphemous by Muslims.
