Dozens arrested as French farmers block Arc de Triomphe

French farmers blocked traffic around Paris's famed Arc de Triomphe monument with tractors and bales of hay on Friday morning, saying the protest was aimed "at saving French agriculture".

Published: 1 March 2024 08:43 CET

Dozens arrested as French farmers block Arc de Triomphe

Tractors parked by the Arc de Triomphe on the Champs-Elysees during a protest by the French farmers' union in Paris on March 1, 2024. Photo by Thomas SAMSON / AFP

Farmers across Europe have been protesting for weeks over what they say are excessively restrictive environmental rules, competition from cheap imports from outside the European Union and low incomes.

The farmers held up banners around the monument on the Champs-Elysées avenue.

Farmer Axel Masson said about 100 of his peers had gathered at the arterial roundabout from 3am “in a peaceful and law-abiding manner”.

The protest was lead by the rightwing, anti-EU farming union Coordination rurale, one of several farming unions who have been involved in protests across France in recent weeks.

“The Rural Coordination takes over the Arc de Triomphe symbolically and peacefully,” the farmers’ union said in a statement on social media platform X, adding that it was a cry to “save” agriculture in France.

Syndicat mobilisé pour sauver notre agriculture la @coordinationrur prend symboliquement et pacifiquement l'Etoile. @BFMTV @CNEWS @LCI @Europe1 @RTLFrance @SudRadio @RMCInfo @lemondefr @franceinfo @FranceTV @Le_Figaro pic.twitter.com/TiNMyDB1ai

— Coordination Rurale (@coordinationrur) March 1, 2024

It said it wanted “wants quick action to save 45 percent of our farms which are in financial distress”.

Masson said the farmers laid a wreath in memory of their colleagues who had been driven to suicide by financial woes, adding: “The state has never heard us”.

Police said they had made 66 arrests and the road is now reopened.

French farmers have continued to block roads, set fire to tyres and lay siege to supermarkets, saying they need more measures, after the government promised reforms.

The nationwide roadblocks mostly came to an end at the start of February with the largest farming unions the FNSEA and Jeune Agriculteurs agreeing to suspend protests after being given assurances by the government.

However they set a deadline of the start of the Salon de l’Agriculture – France’s largest farm show, held every year in Paris – for the government to give more concrete proposals.

The show comes to an end on Sunday, a visit earlier in the week by president Emmanuel Macron was marked by scuffles between police and a small number of protesters.

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In a message sent to staff on Thursday evening, its management said the buildings in central Paris “will remain closed tomorrow, Friday May 3rd. We ask you to continue to work from home”.

A committee of pro-Palestinian students earlier on Thursday announced a “peaceful sit-in” at Sciences Po and said six students were starting a hunger strike “in solidarity with Palestinian victims” in war-torn Gaza.

Sciences Po is widely considered France’s top political science school and counts President Emmanuel Macron among its alumni.

Echoing tense demonstrations rocking many top US universities, students at Sciences Po have staged a series of protests, with some 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 Paris regional authority’s right-wing head Valerie Pécresse temporarily suspended funding to Sciences Po earlier this week over the protests, condemning what she called “a minority of radicalised people calling for anti-Semitic hatred”.

The war started with Hamas’s unprecedented October 7th attack on Israel that resulted in the deaths of 1,170 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

Israel estimates that 129 captives seized by militants during their attack remain in Gaza. The military says 34 of them are dead.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive against Hamas has killed at least 34,596 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.

A member of the student committee who identified himself only as Hicham said the hunger strikes would continue until the university’s board voted on holding an investigation into its partnerships with Israeli universities.

Sciences Po’s acting administrator Jean Basseres said he had refused that call during a debate with students, held at the university in a bid to calm days of protests.

Higher Education Minister Sylvie Retailleau earlier on Thursday called on university heads to “keep order”, including by calling in the police if needed.