- Demonstrations also hold in Germany, where officers fire teargas to disperse crowds as evening falls
Tens of thousands of demonstrators, some in Halloween fancy dress, marched across France on Saturday in a third wave of protests over the soaring cost of living and deteriorating public services nationwide.
In the process, violent clashes erupted in Paris, Marseille and other major cities as what began largely as peaceful protests descended into chaos with the Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez confirming that while roughly 150 planned demonstrations across the country concluded without incident, police were met with an “extraordinary” level of violence from rioting factions late in the day.
According to Nuñez, the escalation turned critical in Paris, where a riot police officer was struck by a Molotov cocktail and he condemned the attack as “attempted murder” while issuing a stark warning to agitators that security forces remain “fully prepared for those looking for further confrontation tonight.”
About 320,000 people. down from an estimated 410,000 last weekend, took part in rallies around the country, the interior ministry said, including 70,000 in Paris who marched along boulevards on the south-eastern outskirts, avoiding the city centre.
As evening approached and the largely peaceful demonstrations came to an end, police in several cities fired teargas and stun grenades to disperse crowds joined – as on the previous Saturday – by groups of masked rioters.
The Interior Ministry said late Saturday that police had arrested 565 people across the country. Four police officers and one gendarme were injured in Paris.
Nuñez said earlier this week that 70,000 police and gendarmes, including elite units, would be deployed in an effort to quell violence on the protests’ sidelines, warning that Saturday looked like “a very high risk” day.
The Paris protesters set off peacefully from the Porte de Bagnolet near the ring road, holding placards with slogans including “No need for teargas to make our future look bleak” and “Disguised as an angry citizen for Halloween”, as a helicopter flew overhead
On and around its destination, the Porte de Charenton, dozens of masked people dressed in black used hammers to pry up paving stones and hurl them at police, and at least one incendiary device was thrown at security forces.
Police responded with teargas and baton charges. “A hardcore of several hundred rioters” had attacked police with projectiles, the Paris police prefecture said. Officers had “manoeuvred to restore public order”, it added.
In Lyon protesters threw projectiles at police, prompting officers to fire teargas, and in Toulouse police used water cannon against an unauthorised protest that drew several thousand people, mostly young demonstrators.
The marches brought together school students, who have been calling for better conditions for a month, trade unions and gilets jaune (yellow vests) protesters united in anger at the cost of living, widening inequalities and Emmanuel Macron’s government.
“The French economy is doing badly no matter what happens, because today we’re being run by a group of incompetents who juggle billions while families are struggling with a few cents,” said one protester on the Paris march, Jérôme Rodrigues, adding: “That’s why we’re here, to keep shouting our demands louder and louder.” – With The Guardian report
