Department for Protection and Security

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Members of the DPS at the National Front party's annual tribute to Joan of Arc in Paris, 2007 May 1st

Department for Protection and Security (DPS) or Département Protection et Sécurité is the "security" branch of the National Front (FN) political party of France, which depends directly from the FN's president and is now led by Eric Staelens^[1].

1 1998 Parliamentary Commission on the acts of the DPS
2 Bernard Courcelle's leadership until Bruno Mégret's scission
3 References
4 External links
5 See also

[edit] 1998 Parliamentary Commission on the acts of the DPS

In 1998, a Parliamentary Commission, led by Socialist MP Bernard Grasset (Green MP Noël Mamère and conservative MP Patrick Devedjian were also part of it [1]), was created to investigate its acts, after several violent incidents during demonstrations and other occasions.^[2] The report was published on June 3, 1999, and pinpointed several cases of DPS member checking identity card of demonstrators instead of the police.^[3] It also pinpointed links with the Groupe Union Défense (GUD), former OAS terrorist members, mercenaries and private military contractors.^[4]^[5] The Parliamentary commission declared that the DPS should have been dissolved end of 1996, after the Montceau-les-Mines affair on October 25, 1996, when a DPS unit acted like an ordinary police order force, alike to the C.R.S. anti-riot units. After the creation of the Mouvement National Républicain (MNR) by Bruno Mégret, an offshoot from the FN, the DPS itself also split into two organizations, the DPS on one side and the DPA (Département Protection Assistance) on the other side.^[6]

A former member of the DPS has given a long interview to daily Libération. Using the pseudonym "Dominique", he explained that the DPS has special "unofficial" intervention squads made up of former paratroopers and Foreign Legionnaires, veterans of French interventions in Chad, Lebanon, and the Central African Republic. Some members of the DPS were present in covert operations in Zaire (1997 and 2001), Madagascar (in 2002, Didier Ratsiraka called for some mercenaries to resolve the political crisis [2]), Côte d'Ivoire (2001-2003)^[7] According to the Voltaire network, he DPS had been created with the help of Jacques Foccart and François de Grossouvre (leader of the French branch of Gladio, NATO's secret armies) after the dissolving of the Service d'Action Civique (SAC) [3] & [4].

[edit] Bernard Courcelle's leadership until Bruno Mégret's scission

They are armed with helmets and shields, gas masks, tear gas launchers, guns that fire rubber bullets, bullet proof vests, clubs, and gloves with lead weights. They have compiled computerized lists of journalists and antifascist activists with their names, addresses, and photos. They engage in punitive actions against their opponents but have, Dominique said, excellent relations with the police, including the police commissioners. They are organized in terms of military ranks such as colonel and captain. According to Liberation, the DPS now has 3,000 members. Since 1993, the group has been commanded by Bernard Courcelle, who claims, "We only defend ourselves. We never attack the meetings of other groups." According to Reporters Sans Frontières, the DPS has records on journalists who follow the Front National's activities and, on several occasions, was responsible for the beating up of reporters.^[8] After Bruno Mégret's split, Bernard Courcelle followed him with 1,700 men from the DPS, and Jean-Marie Le Pen named Marc Bellier to fill his place, and then Jean-Pierre Chabrut^[9]

In 1980, Bernard Courcelle was a member, along with comrade Bruno Gollnisch, of the Direction de la Protection de la Sécurité et de la Défense (DPSD), an official ministry of Defence organization in charge of recruiting mercenaries and informing on weapons traffic. The DPSD had ties, between the two wars, with the terrorist group La Cagoule. In 1983, Bernard Courcelle created a mercenary firm with his brother. The next year, he became the former security director of the French armaments manufacturer, Luchaire. In 1989, he was in charge of security for the Musée d'Orsay, which responsibility was assumed by none other than Anne Pingeot, president François Mitterrand's hidden mistress. In 1993, Courcelle became the leader of the DPS, before becoming in 1999 the leader of Republic of the Congo's president Denis Sassou-Nguesso's personal guard. He then takes charge of the security of the oil company Elf's infrastructures in Pointe-Noire.^[10]