Military programming law project: associations, including the League of Human Rights, denounce the creation of a state of national security alert

The deputies began on Monday the examination of a law updating the military programming voted in 2023. This new text sets out the major directions and means of the French armed forces.

Published on 04/05/2026 at 20:17

Reading time: 1min Nathalie Tehio is the president of the League of Human Rights in France. (JOEL SAGET / AFP)

Several associations and unions, including the League of Human Rights, France Nature Environnement, the Syndicat de la Magistrature, and the CGT, denounced in a tribune published on Sunday, May 3, the establishment, in the military programming bill, of the creation of a “state of national security alert.” “What worries us is that it is actually a state of emergency that does not reveal its name and would be triggered by the government based on very vague and unclear criteria,” denounced Nathalie Tehio, president of the League of Human Rights, on France Inter on Monday.

By triggering this “state of national security alert,” there are “possibilities of derogation from labor law, environmental law, and heritage law,” she worries. This is why “environmental associations have signed” this tribune, “but also the CGT, the FSU, and Solidaires.”

“We already see that with everything related to the military budget, there is no real deliberation, no transparency,” lashes out Nathalie Tehio. “And this is a denial of democracy. Already because we are talking about constrained budget choices and we will touch social benefits by saying that we will have to reduce these benefits for budgetary reasons. Is this the right answer? Is it the right choice?” questions the president of the League of Human Rights. Overall, we are “in situations where there is no transparency.” According to her, “there should be infinitely more safeguards. That’s what a democracy is.”