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PROTESTS

In Pictures: Barricades set on fire in Paris as pension reform protests turn violent

Protesters angered by the French government's surprise move to force through its pension reform clashed with riot police in Paris on Thursday evening as barricades of garbage bins and trash were set on fire in the streets.

Published: 16 March 2023 22:50 CET
In Pictures: Barricades set on fire in Paris as pension reform protests turn violent
French firefighters operate on a fire during a demonstration near Place de la Concorde after the French government pushed a pensions reform through parliament without a vote, using the article 49,3 of the constitution, in Paris on March 16, 2023. Photo by Thomas SAMSON / AFP

Earlier on Thursday a crowd of thousands gathered in front of the parliament in the historic Place de la Concorde in central Paris, watched over by riot police.

They had come together to protest the controversial move by President Emmanuel Macron’s government to force through their unpopular pension reform bill without putting it to the usual vote in the National Assembly.

At around 8pm police used tear gas and water canon to clear protesters away after a fire was lit in the centre of the square, close to an Egyptian obelisk that has stood there for close to 200 years.

Following attempts to clear Place de la Concorde groups of protesters moved through central Paris where some set fire to the piles of rubbish that have been building in recent days after garbage collectors in Paris joined the strikes against the French government’s pension reform.

Barricades of burning trash were also formed to block streets around Place de la Madeleine and the famous Paris Opera house the Palais Garnier in the 8th arrondissment.

Groups of protesters also set fire to piles of rubbish on Rue Saint-Honoré, not far from the Elysée presidential palace.

Scores of riot police moved through the centre of Paris firing tear gas in an attempt to disperse protesters, some of whom responded by hurling objects at police. Shop fronts were also damaged.

Fire fighters were called in to put out the burning barricades.

A French firefighter puts out a fire lit by protesters during a demonstration after the French government pushed a pensions reform through parliament without a vote, using the article 49,3 of the constitution, in Paris on March 16, 2023.(Photo by JULIEN DE ROSA / AFP)
 

French firefighters (C) operate on a fire during a demonstration near Place de la Concorde (Photo by Thomas SAMSON / AFP)

French police officers in riot gear operate during a demonstration on Place de la Concorde. Photo by Thomas SAMSON / AFP)

By around 10.30pm French police said at least 120 protesters had been arrested in the French capital on suspicion of seeking to cause damage. 

There were similar clashes between protesters and police in the western city of Rennes as well as Lyon and Nantes.

Several stores were also looted during protests in the southern city of Marseille.

Antoine Bristielle, a public opinion expert at the Fondation Jean-Jaures think-tank, told AFP that enacting such an important law without a parliament vote risked further antagonising the country and deepening anti-Macron sentiment.

“It will give another boost to the protests. It could lead to more pressure on the government,” he said.

Later on Thursday Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin asked police authorities across France to give protection to local MPs and Senators.

This photograph taken in Paris on March 16, 2023 show a motor scooter burning during a demonstration after the French government pushed a pensions reform through parliament without a vote, using the article 49,3 of the constitution. (Photo by JULIEN DE ROSA / AFP)

“I’m outraged by what’s happening. I feel like I’m being cheated as a citizen,” said Laure Cartelier, a 55-year-old schoolteacher who had come to express her outrage. “In a democracy, it should have happened through a vote.”

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POLITICS

Why is France accusing Azerbaijan of stirring tensions in New Caledonia?

France's government has no doubt that Azerbaijan is stirring tensions in New Caledonia despite the vast geographical and cultural distance between the hydrocarbon-rich Caspian state and the French Pacific territory.

Published: 17 May 2024 08:48 CEST
Why is France accusing Azerbaijan of stirring tensions in New Caledonia?

Azerbaijan vehemently rejects the accusation it bears responsibility for the riots that have led to the deaths of five people and rattled the Paris government.

But it is just the latest in a litany of tensions between Paris and Baku and not the first time France has accused Azerbaijan of being behind an alleged disinformation campaign.

The riots in New Caledonia, a French territory lying between Australia and Fiji, were sparked by moves to agree a new voting law that supporters of independence from France say discriminates against the indigenous Kanak population.

Paris points to the sudden emergence of Azerbaijani flags alongside Kanak symbols in the protests, while a group linked to the Baku authorities is openly backing separatists while condemning Paris.

“This isn’t a fantasy. It’s a reality,” interior minister Gérald Darmanin told television channel France 2 when asked if Azerbaijan, China and Russia were interfering in New Caledonia.

“I regret that some of the Caledonian pro-independence leaders have made a deal with Azerbaijan. It’s indisputable,” he alleged.

But he added: “Even if there are attempts at interference… France is sovereign on its own territory, and so much the better”.

“We completely reject the baseless accusations,” Azerbaijan’s foreign ministry spokesman Ayhan Hajizadeh said.

“We refute any connection between the leaders of the struggle for freedom in Caledonia and Azerbaijan.”

In images widely shared on social media, a reportage broadcast Wednesday on the French channel TF1 showed some pro-independence supporters wearing T-shirts adorned with the Azerbaijani flag.

Tensions between Paris and Baku have grown in the wake of the 2020 war and 2023 lightning offensive that Azerbaijan waged to regain control of its breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region from ethnic Armenian separatists.

France is a traditional ally of Christian Armenia, Azerbaijan’s neighbour and historic rival, and is also home to a large Armenian diaspora.

Darmanin said Azerbaijan – led since 2003 by President Ilham Aliyev, who succeeded his father Heydar – was a “dictatorship”.

On Wednesday, the Paris government also banned social network TikTok from operating in New Caledonia.

Tiktok, whose parent company is Chinese, has been widely used by protesters. Critics fear it is being employed to spread disinformation coming from foreign countries.

Azerbaijan invited separatists from the French territories of Martinique, French Guiana, New Caledonia and French Polynesia to Baku for a conference in July 2023.

The meeting saw the creation of the “Baku Initiative Group”, whose stated aim is to support “French liberation and anti-colonialist movements”.

The group published a statement this week condemning the French parliament’s proposed change to New Caledonia’s constitution, which would allow outsiders who moved to the territory at least 10 years ago the right to vote in its elections.

Pro-independence forces say that would dilute the vote of Kanaks, who make up about 40 percent of the population.

“We stand in solidarity with our Kanak friends and support their fair struggle,” the Baku Initiative Group said.

Raphael Glucksmann, the lawmaker heading the list for the French Socialists in June’s European Parliament elections, told Public Senat television that Azerbaijan had made “attempts to interfere… for months”.

He said the underlying problem behind the unrest was a domestic dispute over election reform, not agitation fomented by “foreign actors”.

But he accused Azerbaijan of “seizing on internal problems.”

A French government source, who asked not to be named, said pro-Azerbaijani social media accounts had on Wednesday posted an edited montage purporting to show two white police officers with rifles aimed at dead Kanaks.

“It’s a pretty massive campaign, with around 4,000 posts generated by (these) accounts,” the source told AFP.

“They are reusing techniques already used during a previous smear campaign called Olympia.”

In November, France had already accused actors linked to Azerbaijan of carrying out a disinformation campaign aimed at damaging its reputation over its ability to host the Olympic Games in Paris. Baku also rejected these accusations.

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