France is in shock today after a far-left activist was left brain dead following a fight with skinheads in the heart of Paris' shopping district.

Clément Méric, 18, was shopping with friends near the St Lazare railway station last night when the fight broke out.

According to reports the group were confronted by a gang of three skinheads before being attacked by a larger group.

Interior Minister Manuel Valls said the fight broke out between two groups of young people in a pedestrian street just steps away from the famous Printemps department store.

At one point, the 18-year-old leftist was beaten by several skinheads, according to Valls, a widely respected, center-leaning member of President Francois Hollande's Socialist government.

It was unclear how the fight developed and how many people were involved.

Politicians from across the political spectrum have condemned violence.

Manuel Valls said: There is no place for small neo-Nazi groups whose enemy is the nation," he said. "A group of the extreme right is at the heart of this assassination. There is a discourse of hate and a climate that favors this discourse. We need to pay attention to this because they threaten our values."

The Party of the Left said Meric, one of its activists, was declared brain dead. The party, one of several small political movements on France's vocal and active far left, called for demonstrations in Paris on Wednesday against violence by groups on the extreme right.

The victim, Clement Meric, is a student at Sciences Po, one of France's most prestigious universities, according to the school.

More than 15,000 people took to the streets across France following the death of 18-year-old left-wing activist Clement Meric.


At least 6,000 demonstrated in Paris, calling on the government to ban extreme right-wing groups that have become bolder following the legalization of same-sex marriage in the country.


Protesters carried banners emblazoned with “Don’t forget, don’t forgive,” and chanted anti-fascist slogans in the French capital’s 5th and 6th districts, near Notre Dame Cathedral.


“Fascism is gangrene, we either destroy it or it will destroy us,” chanted members of Action Antifasciste Paris-Banlieue, a group in which Clement had been a member.


In Toulouse, demonstrators held banners that read “As some protest, others kill” and “Where is the humanity?”