French prosecutors said on Monday they had launched a probe after a 21-year-old man died by suicide following what his family said was years of racist harassment.
The young man's body was found on Monday last week in Chatonnay, a village of around 2,000 people in Isère, in the French Alps.
Rights groups have warned of a rise in racist rhetoric ahead of next year's presidential election, which the anti-immigration Rassemblement National (RN) party hopes to win.
The victim's parents on Friday filed a legal complaint, alleging psychological harassment and incitement to suicide, prosecutor Olivier Rabot told AFP.
The parents said their son had suffered racist abuse for several years by young people in the village, their lawyer Elise Rey-Jacquot told AFP.
