French high school students on Friday lit fires and hurled projectiles at police who responded by firing tear gas, as activists urged new rallies in an escalating protest movement demanding better conditions in education.
The government says that the pupils in their mid-to-late-teens studying in lycees have every right to air grievances but has condemned violence which has included a policeman being chased, kicked and beaten by a group of youths.
In La Ciotat in southern France, a teacher was sprayed with petrol before being physically assaulted by two individuals, officials said.
On Friday, unions and student groups urged protesters to keep up the pressure on the government and stage new rallies on Tuesday.
“High school students are expecting concrete measures from this government, and so far we have not received them,” said Ryad Rani, head of the USL high school union.
The movement, which began in the Paris region in September and spread nationwide, has seen teenage pupils at lycees in their final years of schooling block access to buildings and clash with police.
The students say their school hours are excessively long, conditions inadequate including overheated classrooms, and that there are too many staff absences.
The protests have had political reverberations seven months before voters choose President Emmanuel Macron’s successor.
Of the country’s 3,700 schools, 735 were affected “in one way or another” on Friday, down 30 percent from Thursday, Education Minister Edouard Geffray said after talks with activists.
He said that three staff members had been injured, compared with 31 on Thursday.
Geffray said an action plan aimed at “speeding up the replacement” of absent teachers would be launched.
– ‘Violent repression’ –
Students and police traded accusations of violence.
James, a high school student in the northern city of Lille, denounced what he called “extremely violent police repression, which inevitably fuels students’ anger.”
“When we see fellow students being beaten, choked, blinded in one eye, and tear-gassed from all sides while we’re simply trying to have a dialogue with the government, of course it makes people angry,” he said.
In the western city of Brest, police used tear gas at the Kerichen high school as pupils hurled projectiles at security forces, an AFP photographer said.
Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said images from the eastern city of Belfort showing a group of youths encircle a lone policeman and kick him to the ground were of a “rare violence and intolerable”.
In Paris on Friday, fire damaged the entrances of two high schools, with the fire brigade called to extinguish the blazes, an AFP photographer said.
The police force has launched internal probes after accusations of brutality against demonstrators.
In the southern city of Toulouse, protesters administered eye drops to each other after police used tear gas, AFP images showed.
In Aubervilliers, north of Paris, police used batons and riot shields to control protesters.
– ‘Children in danger’ –
The government has accused the hard left France Unbowed (LFI) — whose firebrand leader Jean-Luc Melenchon is again standing for the presidency — of being behind the movement.
But senior LFI official Manuel Bompard accused the government of “descending into conspiracy theories”.
The education minister said “the high school student movement is being held hostage by ultra-violent fringe groups”.
Geffray told BFMTV at least 65 staff members have been injured, including 40 high school principals, since the start of the movement.
Some 170 students have been wounded while over 100 high schools have suffered “severe damage”, he said.
“What matters now is ensuring our children are no longer out on the streets, because they are in danger.”
According to Nunez, more than 300 police officers and gendarmes were injured.
Outside the Claude Monet school in southern Paris, 53-year-old Anya stood on tiptoes, worried her teenage son might have come to join the protest.
“We banned him from coming. I hope he isn’t here, but he did leave the house,” she said, keeping a safe distance from a burning rubbish bin. “We’re afraid the situation might escalate.”
Around 2,000 people have been taken into police custody, 90 percent of whom were minors, said Justice Minister Gerald Darmanin.
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