Paris attacks: Bega Valley family’s French connection

Seventeen-year-old Amandine Ahrens, who spent time at the Bega District News office as a work experience student earlier this year, has relatives in Paris and spent four months there in 2014. 

She and her mother, who grew up outside of the city, were stunned when they heard the attacks took place. 

“We got the news on Saturday and were so shocked, so mortified that people would go to that extreme,” Amandine said. 

“It is such a shame that the terrorists did it under the face of religion.

“No religion promotes their ideas of the killing of innocents.

“Where is humanity going?” 

The Sapphire Coast Anglican College student said her mother was afraid for the people she cares about back in France.

“She’s had enough of the civilians of France being attacked,” she said. 

After January’s Charlie Hebdo shootings in Paris that left 12 people dead, Amandine visited the city as she was passing through France.

She remembered going to a train station where there were over 20 policemen and their dogs – although she said the policemen were not cold, but were promoting a sense of security so she and her family felt safe.

“But there was a lot of tension in the air,” she said. 

“Everyone in our family was telling us to lay low because it was too intense.

“All the people we were in contact with were told to stay home.” 

While the attacks on Paris were horrendous, she was disappointed the mainstream media had overlooked other tragic news – such as in June how the UK-based Syrian Observatory of Human Rights reported over 3000 people had been killed by Islamic State (formerly ISIS) in Syria from June 2014 to the same month this year, including 1787 civilians with 74 of them children.

Another issue she said was important was how the Syrian Observatory of Human Rights reported they had documented the deaths of 162 civilians, including 51 children, among the almost 3000 people killed in airstrikes on Syria by the US-led coalition. 

“The media is using the Paris attacks to boost people’s anger,” Amandine said. 

“It’s promoting hostility towards the culture of the terrorists who attacked and to refugees in general. 

“The world needs leaders like Gandhi or Nelson Mandela because our leaders worldwide are unfit for the jobs at hand.”