Sixth evening of tensions. New wild rallies took place all over France this Tuesday evening, the day after the failure of two motions of censure in the Assembly, synonymous with the final adoption of the highly contested pension reform.
In Paris, 3,500 people, according to the police headquarters, gathered in the Place de la République, first calmly, before clashes with the police against a backdrop of projectiles and tear gas.
On the spot, our journalist felt the atmosphere tense at the start of the evening, before a return to calm later. According to a police source, 46 people were arrested in the capital. This remains less than the day before, when 234 people were arrested in the capital (287 in total in France).
A few clashes continued shortly before midnight towards Bastille, where tensions finally concentrated and where garbage cans were still on fire.
Other processions were held in Lille or Grenoble, as well as in Rennes, Nantes and Le Mans. In Lille, scuffles pitted the police against some 250 young people, who notably burned a few trash cans and briefly disrupted the Series Mania festival. Around 9 p.m., a few dozen demonstrators tried to burst onto the festival’s red carpet, notably shouting anti-Macron slogans, but were quickly repelled by a police charge, noted an AFP journalist. According to several witnesses on the spot, the demonstrators tried to raise the security barriers and disrupted the show, while the American actress Marcia Cross had just paraded on the red carpet.
Four arrests in Rennes
In Rennes, 4,000 people, some of whom were carrying torches according to the organizers, 1,200 according to the prefecture, strolled peacefully through the city center. A few hundred of them, however, continued on their way for a “wild demonstration”, separating into small groups to thwart the police device. Around 11 p.m., the prefecture of Ille-et-Vilaine reported eleven interventions by firefighters on fire starts, including a vehicle set on fire by a nearby garbage bin fire, and “four arrests for fire and rebellion”.
In Nantes, the 10,000 demonstrators according to the unions, 4,100 according to the police, some of whom were carrying torches, chanted in particular: “Chopped careers, shitty pensions! “. On the sidelines of the procession, degradations were committed, in particular ransacked businesses and tags like “49.3 it will not pass” or “Macron only understands the riot”.
These rallies follow the failure on Monday of two motions of censure in the Assembly, ratifying the adoption of the pension reform. A first wave of demonstrations took place in several cities in France on Monday evening and nearly 300 people were arrested, including 234 in Paris.
Emmanuel Macron estimated this Tuesday evening that it was necessary to “appease” and “listen to the anger” of the French after the disputed adoption of the text by Parliament, while affirming that “the crowd” had no “legitimacy” against to elected officials.
These words are unlikely to calm popular anger as the ninth day of inter-union mobilization is scheduled for Thursday and looks particularly tense. The Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin announced on this occasion the deployment of 12,000 police and gendarmes, including 5,000 in Paris, the most important device since the beginning of the mobilization against the pension reform.