French riot police have been caught on film dragging women along the ground with babies on their backs while evicting immigrants.

The video posted online by a housing rights group shows CRS officers with batons scuffling with African immigrant women at an encampment in the suburbs of Paris.

One of the women, visibly pregnant, is seen lying on the pavement apparently in a daze after the confrontation.

Among other incidents, the footage also shows police dragging a woman across the ground with her infant trailing behind in the dirt.

The evacuation, condemned by human rights campaigners as "brutal", was handled "according to legal procedures and rules", according to the government of the Seine-Saint-Denis region around La Corneuve.