Riot police clash with student protesters as France engulfed by mass school protests
Riot police used tear gas and water cannon in violent clashes with protesters during France’s largest school demonstrations so far.
The French interior ministry said at least 260,000 people took part in marches in multiple cities on Tuesday, including Paris, Marseille, Nantes and Lyon, while the inter-union group claimed as many as 450,000 demonstrators were involved across the country.
Half of France’s 3,700 high schools were shut or partially closed as a result of the protests, which started as an appeal for better conditions but have grown over the last fortnight and become increasingly dangerous.
A one year-old baby in a pram was hit by a firework in an incident near a school in Saint-Cyr-l’École, Paris, the day after a teenager lost a hand picking up a grenade thrown by police.
In Strasbourg, Lyon and Rennes, protesters set the streets ablaze as they torched barricades, and threw multiple projectiles and mortars towards the police. The government claims the protest movement has been hijacked by outsiders and morphed into urban violence.
French prime minister Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu announced classes would be suspended for the rest of the week in a bid to calm the situation down.
“Burning down a high school does not improve the state of high school buildings,” he said. “Lynching a teacher does not help replace teachers.”
He also denounced the “extreme violence” that he said has been knocking “on the door of high schools”, which he “condemned unconditionally”.
Lecornu told lawmakers at least 215 teenagers and 85 school staff had so far been injured in the clashes to date, “the heaviest toll in decades paid by the school system”. His office said more than 700 police officers had also been hurt.
More than 6,000 people have been arrested over the last week, a figure set to increase as the result of Tuesday’s chaos. Authorities have been accused of using disproportionate force against young people.
Students, teachers and parents have all joined the protests to voice their anger over overcrowded classrooms, teacher shortages and dilapidated school buildings.
“There is such a gap between the elites and us,” said Hugo Vetzel, a recent high-school graduate in Strasbourg.
“We want more money for the national educational system so that high schools are renovated,” said Roberta, another recent high-school graduate at a protest outside Paris’ prestigious Henri IV school. Schools have been facing a list of problems from water leaks to rat infestations, she added.
In Paris, a woman wearing a white helmet held a placard reading “supportive parents” during a demonstration, which was also joined by MPs, including Ecologiste et Social’s MP Alexis Corbiere, and French director, screenwriter and actress Laetitia Dosch.
