French TV admits airing 1,314 arrests from wrong country

Two major French television networks apologized this weekend after showing protest footage from Albania as if it were being captured in France. The errors occurred on Saturday while millions watched coverage of nearly 300 demonstrations across the country. The protests addressed school funding and rising living costs, drawing hundreds of thousands of participants.

CNEWS aired the first mistake during a broadcast of a march in southern Paris. The channel labeled images of people on a street as the Porte d’Italie district in Paris. The scene included individuals clapping and one waving a red flag. The AP later verified that the video was actually shot at Rruga e Durrësit in Tirana, the capital of Albania.

A commentator on the CNEWS broadcast described the masked figures in the footage as behaving like future rioters. This suggested a potential for violence in Paris, even though the images were foreign. Olivier Benkemoun, a presenter for the channel, admitted the error on air. He stated that the control room received video feeds from multiple locations and misidentified some of them.

Benkemoun said, “We made a mistake in the control room.” He added that the images of people covering their faces came from Albania. The channel’s website described the incident as a “confusion of images.” Critics on social media reacted quickly to the slip. Jean-Luc Mélenchon, a far-left presidential candidate, called the decision to use Albanian footage to simulate a live Paris broadcast pathetic.

Public broadcaster Franceinfo made a similar error on the same day. The network showed officers in riot gear advancing down a street behind two trucks firing water cannons. A presenter identified the location as Lyon in southeastern France and described the situation there as a bit tense. The AP confirmed the footage was from Bulevardi Dëshmorët e Kombit in central Tirana.

The Franceinfo presenter corrected the mistake three minutes after the initial broadcast. He stated that the images were live from Tirana, not Lyon, and presented the network’s excuses. The confusion did not prevent actual clashes in France. At the end of the Paris demonstration, masked protesters threw objects and fireworks at police.

Police responded with tear gas, sound grenades, and water cannons. Scattered violence also occurred in other towns. The Interior Ministry reported 1,314 arrests on Sunday. This figure covers the nationwide demonstrations that took place over the weekend.