🇫🇷 Why Jean Lafaurie Still Tells His Story: 102 YO, French Resistance, Survived Dachau Prison, WW2; Current Warning

Last edited Sun Apr 26, 2026, 06:17 AM - Edit history (2)

- 'I’m the only person who can do it': Why 102-year-old Dachau survivor Jean Lafaurie tells his story,' France24, Interview, April 26, 2026.
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A member of the French Resistance who was deported to Dachau concentration camp, 102-year-old Jean Lafaurie continues to share his story with generations of students – and warn them about the hard right’s return in Europe. Ahead of France’s National Day of Remembrance for Victims and Heroes of the Deportation, Lafaurie told FRANCE 24 about the solidarity that helped him and other prisoners survive the hell of Dachau.

Jean Lafaurie at his home in Seine-et- Marne, 102 years old, still resisting. (04:19 mins).

- "Democracy and freedom must be defended, because they can be taken away at any moment." - Jean Lafaurie
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"I’m still a member of the resistance. I resist everything! The proof is that I’m still here.” With a playful smile, Jean Lafaurie repeats the words that he has lived by his whole life: to continue to resist, no matter what. He wears his 102 years lightly. Since his wife’s death, he lives by himself in his own home in the Seine-et-Marne department east of Paris, and manages his own packed schedule.

Immaculately dressed, he receives visitors with a smile on his lips and a tie knotted firmly around his neck.

The centenarian still looks at the world through the twinkling eyes of a boy who learned to say “no” at an early age.

“The red one is the Legion of Honour. The yellow is the Military Medal. The other one, it’s for volunteers who fought for the Resistance. And this one is the medal of deportation – the other one, I can’t remember anymore.” His proud eyes pass over the medals he earned half a lifetime ago. “The most beautiful to me is the Military Medal, because to receive it you have to have done something special – a major act for the Resistance.”

‘Patriotic to the core’ Lafaurie’s life spent fighting for his beliefs began in the small town of Souillac in France’s southwestern Lot region, where he was born to a family of modest means. He left school at 13 years old, throwing himself into the ideas that drove France’s left-wing Popular Front and the country’s thriving union movement... - Read More,

https://www.france24.com/en/france/20260426-i-m-the-only-person-who-can-do-it-why-102-year-old-dachau-survivor-jean-lafaurie-tells-his-story