Student anger over school conditions flares into arson and clashes, prompting a government crisis response.
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Student anger over school conditions flares into arson and clashes, prompting a government crisis response.
Fires broke out at several French schools on Thursday, damaging buildings. In Nantes, a blaze started in a bin and spread to the entrance hall of the Nelson Mandela high school. A fire also engulfed an entrance to a school in Rouen.
Other incidents turned violent. In Marseille, staff at Victor Hugo high school were reportedly splashed with petrol, while a headteacher in the village of Auchel was injured in the ear by a stray firework.
The fires occurred amid widespread student protests and blockades at hundreds of lycées, equivalent to high schools, across France. The unrest began last week over complaints of a lack of teachers, overcrowded classrooms, and decaying facilities.
University students also joined on Thursday, blockading at least 30 campuses. The protests disrupted public transport in cities like Marseille and Strasbourg, where tram tracks were blocked.
Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu held a crisis meeting on Thursday, canceling ministerial trips to address the unrest. The government described the demonstrations as having descended into urban violence.
Police made hundreds of arrests. According to French media, 625 people were arrested on Wednesday alone, and more than 600 were arrested by midday on Thursday outside Paris, the BBC reported. France 24 also reported hundreds of arrests in clashes with protesters.
Students protesting voiced specific grievances. A 17-year-old in Strasbourg named Raphael told AFP that his school building was falling apart, with leaky rooms, an insufficient number of toilets, and a cafeteria that was too small.
He said there was zero budget and not enough supervisors. The protests are organized by a union representing lycée students and have become politicized, with the government and hard-right politicians blaming the hard left.
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France's prime minister convened a crisis meeting on Thursday and canceled ministers' trips to focus on the nationwide spread of protests, some violent, by high school students venting against under-resourced schools, long hours and other complaints. The demonstrations erupted in Paris-region schools last week and have snowballed,
French teenagers on Tuesday set fire to rubbish bins and threw projectiles at police who responded with batons and tear gas, as pupils kept up blockades and protests at hundreds of high schools, demanding better conditions. The movement in the lycees, attended by students aged 15 to 18 for their final three years of
The French government holds a crisis meeting as demonstrations grow and become violent in places.
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