Security forces fired tear gas and stun grenades at Paris protesters marching against police violence and a draft law to protect officers' identity – after demonstrators erected barricades and threw fireworks and stones on Saturday.

Across France, people took part in demonstrations after images of police beating a black music producer fanned anger about a new law that is seen as curbing the right of journalists to report on police abuse.

In Paris protesters started fires and clashed with police who tried to block access to certain streets. Several cars, a newspaper kiosk and a brasserie were set ablaze close to Place de la Bastille, police said. 

Some 46,000 people marched in Paris and 133,000 in total nationwide, the interior ministry said. Protest organisers said some 500,000 joined nationwide, including 200,000 in the capital.

They were protesting against the draft bill that makes it a crime to circulate images of police officers in certain circumstances, which opponents say limits press freedom.

"We have felt for a long time to have been the victim of institutionalised racism from the police," said Mohamed Magassa, 35, who works in a reception center for minors.

"But now we feel that this week all of France has woken up."

Sophie Misiraca, 46, a lawyer, said: "The fundamental and basic liberties of our democracy are being attacked – freedom of expression and information."

President Emmanuel Macron said on Friday that images of the beating of music producer Michel Zecler in Paris last weekend "shame us."

"Police everywhere, justice nowhere" and "police state" were among the slogans brandished by protesters in Place de la Republique in Paris.

An investigation has been opened against the four police involved in the alleged racial attack as critics say that the images would never had been made public if the contentious Article 24 of the security legislation was made law.

The officers were brought before a judge on Sunday, a source close to the investigation told AFP.

The source said the officers faced the judge around noon. The officers, who have been suspended from duty and being held by the National Police Inspectorate General (IGPN), are under investigation for "violence with a racist motive" and false testimony.

The article would criminalize the publication of images of on-duty police officers with the intent of harming their "physical or psychological integrity." It was passed by the National Assembly, although it is awaiting Senate approval.

Under the article, offenders could be fined $53,000 and sentenced to up to a year in jail for sharing images of police officers.

The controversy over the law and police violence is developing into another crisis for the government as Macron confronts the pandemic and its economic fallout.

The images of the beating of Zecler emerged days after the police were already being criticized over the forcible removal of a migrant camp in central Paris.

A series of high-profile cases against police officers regarding the mistreatment of black or Arab citizens has raised accusations of institutionalized racism. The force has insisted violations are the fault of isolated individuals.

In a letter seen by the AFP news agency, Paris police chief Didier Lallement wrote to officers to tell them: "In the coming days, the coming weeks... there's no doubt you will face difficulty, doubt, even anger and fear." But he insisted that he could "count on the integrity, sense of honor and ethics" in the force.

Video editor: Nuri Moseinco