Clashes in Paris after latest pension protests

Fresh clashes have been reported in Paris on Tuesday as tens of thousands protested in the French capital against President Emmanuel Macron's pension reform, AFP correspondents said.

Published: 28 March 2023 17:45 CEST

Clashes in Paris after latest pension protests

A blazing bin, pictured in Paris on March 28th at a demo against pension reform. Photo by JULIEN DE ROSA / AFP

Police used tear gas and launched a charge after some people at the head of the protest, dressed in black with their faces covered, raided a grocery store and then sparked a fire as the march closed in on Place de la Nation in the east of the city.

Poubelle, chariot, extincteur… tout est bon pour attiser le feu. #Manif28Mars @Le_Figaro pic.twitter.com/MkLA0kU3nH

— Elisabeth Pierson (@zazpierson) March 28, 2023

Reporters on the ground have reported bins and street furniture being set on fire.

At least 22 people were arrested in the capital by the afternoon, Paris police said.

Thick smoke on Paris’s Boulevard Voltaire, fire(s) set alight.
Crowds are packed into the streets here, so much that the protest can’t move forwards.#f24 #FranceProtests pic.twitter.com/oQ1aH73CrK

— Catherine Norris Trent (@cntrentF24) March 28, 2023

🔴 Affrontements en cours à #Paris en tête de la #Manif28Mars #greve28mars pic.twitter.com/ILeKel0YQi

— Clément Lanot (@ClementLanot) March 28, 2023

Tuesday was another day of strikes and mass demonstrations against the government’s planned pension reform.

The reported clashes in Paris took place close to the route of the protest march end in Nation, but many of the trouble-makers were black-clad and masked and did not appear to be part of the peaceful demonstrations.

Some appeared to be targeting the police, who have been the subject of much anger over heavy-handed policing of previous protests.

Tout mon soutien à @qbataillon, dont la permanence parlementaire a été une nouvelle fois attaquée par les casseurs de l’extrême-gauche.

À travers ce lieu symbolique de notre démocratie, ce sont nos institutions qu’ils veulent détruire. Nous ne leur céderons rien. pic.twitter.com/VA7il1vAup

— Franck Riester (@franckriester) March 28, 2023

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Police intervened as dozens of students gathered on a central Paris campus of the prestigious Sciences Po university on Wednesday evening, management said.

“After discussions with management, most of them agreed to leave the premises,” university officials said in a statement to AFP, saying the protest was adding to “tensions” at the university.

But “a small group of students” refused to leave and “it was decided that the police would evacuate the site,” the statement added.

Sciences Po said it regretted that “numerous attempts” to have the students leave the premises peacefully had led nowhere.

According to the police préfecture, students had set up around 10 tents.

When members of law enforcement arrived, “50 students left on their own, 70 were evacuated calmly from 0.20am” and the police “left at 1.30am, with no incidents to report,” the police said.

The protesters demanded that Sciences Po “cut its ties with universities and companies that are complicit in the genocide in Gaza” and “end the repression of pro-Palestinian voices on campus,” according to witnesses.

The protest was organised by the Palestine Committee of Sciences Po.

In a statement on Thursday, the group said its activists had been “carried out of the school by more than fifty members of the security forces,” adding that “around a hundred” police officers were “also waiting for them outside”.

Sciences Po management “stubbornly refuses to engage in genuine dialogue,” the group said.

The organisers have called for “a clear condemnation of Israel’s actions by Sciences Po” and a commemorative event “in memory of the innocent people killed by Israel,” among other demands.

Separately, the Student Union of Sciences Po Paris said the decision by university officials to call in the police was “both shocking and deeply worrying” and reflected “an unprecedented authoritarian turn”.

Many top US universities have been rocked by protests in recent weeks, with some students furious over the Israel-Hamas war and ensuing humanitarian crisis in the besieged Palestinian territory of Gaza.

France is home to the world’s largest Jewish population after Israel and the United States, as well as Europe’s biggest Muslim community.

The war in Gaza began with an unprecedented attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas on Israel on October 7th that resulted in the deaths of around 1,170 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

In retaliation, Israel launched a military offensive that has killed at least 34,305 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.