China News Agency, Paris, July 24 (Reporter Li Yang) The French Parliament passed two new bills aimed at combating terrorism and extremism in the past two days.
The French National Assembly (lower house of parliament) finally passed the anti-separatism bill on the 23rd. The vote on that day was 49 votes in favor, 19 votes against, and 5 abstentions.
The French ruling party voted in favor; the main opposition parties such as the Socialist Party and the Republican Party voted against; the far-right party led by Marina Le Pen abstained.
The bill includes a series of important measures, which mainly include maintaining the neutrality of public services, protecting civil servants and teachers, supervising family education, strengthening the control of associations, and providing transparency to religious groups.
The bill has been deliberated by the National Assembly and the Senate for more than half a year, and the two houses of the parliament jointly set up a committee to review the content of the bill. The purpose of the bill is to maintain the "principles of the Republic."
The head of the relevant committee guarantees that the content of the bill does not target a specific religion.
In addition, the French National Assembly passed another new bill with 108 votes in favor and 20 votes against on the 22nd to strengthen the tracking of extremist activities, especially to strengthen the monitoring of extremist-related network activities to prevent terrorist attacks.
Both of these bills were proposed by the French government and received strong support from the French government.
French President Macron disclosed the main content of the anti-separatism bill to the public in October last year.
The new bill to strengthen the tracking of extremist activities was introduced by the government in April this year and is considered part of the official response to terrorism.
French Interior Minister Darmanin is the main supporter of the two new bills.
On the 23rd, he welcomed the passage of the new bill through social media, and specifically pointed out that the final passage of the anti-separatism bill "enables us to obtain appropriate means to deal with those who try to abuse the values of the Republic by abuse of religion."
In the past year, there have been many attacks in France, resulting in many casualties.
The most recent attack occurred in April this year when a policewoman was killed by a knife attacker at a police station in Rambouillet, Yvelines, on the outskirts of Paris.
The French official stressed that the country will continue to firmly fight terrorism.
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