Franz Ferdinand Fans Pepper-Sprayed By Police

Fans of Franz Ferdinand were assaulted with pepper spray and tear gas by police at a festival in the Brazilian city of Sao Paulo last weekend.

NME reports the Scottish foursome were scheduled for a free open-air performance in the early of Sunday May 27, as part of Brazil’s Cultura Inglesa Festival. Following supports slots from The Horrors and We Have Band, the Scottish foursome began drawing a “larger than expected” crowd to their show.

Though the site at Sao Paulo’s Independence Park had yet to reach its 20,000 person capacity, many attendees were locked out by festival organisers who closed the gates to the venue after the numbers began rapidly growing.

Representatives of the Cultura Inglesa Festival issued a statement conveying their regrets that so many fans were kept outside, but reasoned it was as a result of dealing with the over-sized crowd.

The real trouble started however when fans, desperate to catch a glimpse of Franz, begin scaling the fences in an attempt to gain entry. In response, police forces began using pepper spray, tear gas and forming human barricades to break up the crowd.

The same statement issued by festival organisers deemed the police “were forced to take such drastic measures” and that their actions were “necessary.”

Franz frontman, Alex Kapranos, took to twitter upon hearing of the police attacks, writing:

Hope any fans caught outside the gig tonight were OK and weren’t hurt in this collision with the police I’m hearing about.

— alex kapranos (@alkapranos) May 27, 2012

As well as responding to fans’ pleas

We knew nothing of this. Awful news. RT @willmummy “Paulista” police acts like the chinese police in Tian’anmen Square…

— alex kapranos (@alkapranos) May 27, 2012