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Post by Admin on Dec 3, 2018 18:02:07 GMT
On the Avenue Kléber, one of the toniest streets in Paris and heart of the district where Macron will have been expecting to resettle his beloved bankers, fleeing London like the sans culottes, every bank has been attacked, every shop window broken, upscale apartments have been attacked and every Porsche and Mercedes within blocks set on fire. Invest in France? Emmanuel Macron is undoubtedly brilliant. He won all the glittering academic prizes. He had a supersonic ascent into the stratosphere of the French civil service. He even did a spell as a courtier with David de Rothschild’s investment bank, before ascending to minister of the economy under François Hollande, and then winning the most glittering prize of all, the presidency of the republic, aged 39¾. But his hubris, arrogance and almost autistic detachment from the French in the street is in a class with Marie Antoinette. Except that this time around, the courtier whispers, “Mr President, the people cannot afford diesel.” To which the cloth-eared Macron has, in effect replied: “Let them buy Teslas.” At the blockade on the roundabout outside my local Super U supermarket, la France en bas is not impressed. There has been little violence here, though the local anarchists did attack the village petrol station, putting it out of action for two days. As of this morning, though, the main A9 autoroute between southern France and Spain has been closed for more than 72 hours. There are elements to the protest that are both surreal and terrifying. At the Pezenas exit, the gilets have moved a piano onto the carriageway, and are entertaining the stranded lorry drivers. At Narbonne, just down the highway, a gilet armed with a front end loader picked up a burning car, lifted it high into the air, and dropped it on the toll station. The ungovernable slums around the major cities in France are on the edge. The police are exhausted. Be sure of this, what is happening in France is not over.
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Post by Admin on Dec 7, 2018 18:44:33 GMT
Around 200 French high schools were blocked or disrupted Thursday by students protesting a raft of education overhauls, on a fourth day of action called to coincide with anti-government demonstrations which have rocked the country in recent weeks. Dozens of people wearing face masks threw Molotov cocktails, torched trash bins and clashed with police in several cities during violent protests ahead of a call for nationwide demonstrations on Friday. "The situations are quite varied, with total or partial blockages, barricades to control access, burning pallets," an education ministry official told AFP. Although the students are demanding an end to testing overhauls and stricter university entrance requirements, they have seized on the momentum of the ongoing "yellow vest" protests against President Emmanuel Macron.
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Post by Admin on Dec 8, 2018 17:48:10 GMT
A fourth weekend of Yellow Vest protests is held under the banner “All to the Elysee” on Saturday, December 8 in Paris. The Yellow Vest movement emerged spontaneously last month after French President Emmanuel Macron announced controversial hikes in fuel prices to encourage a transition towards greener energy. The French government have now suspended the prices hikes but despite this the protests continue.
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Post by Admin on Dec 10, 2018 17:48:10 GMT
"We're the ones who are going to eventually have to pay higher fuel prices," said Ines, one of around 150 high school students demonstrating in the southern Paris suburb of Cachan. The "yellow vest" protests began on November 17 in opposition to rising fuel taxes, but they have since ballooned into a broad challenge to Macron's pro-business agenda and style of governing. The government announced Wednesday it would cancel planned increases in fuel tax due to take effect in January in a bid to appease the mostly low-income protesters from small-town and rural France. "With the yellow vests as a pretext, we're seeing all sorts of individuals joining with people demonstrating in good faith, including students, and this is leading to serious violence," Education Minister Jean-Michel Blanquer told BFM television.
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Post by Admin on Dec 16, 2018 17:42:54 GMT
Further protests against the French president take place at the Elysee on Saturday, December 15.
Protests emerged spontaneously last month after Macron announced controversial hikes in fuel prices to encourage a transition towards greener energy. Earlier this week, in an effort to win back the people he announced he would raise the monthly minimum wage by €100 and cut hikes. Despite this the demonstrations continue.
"Yellow vest" protesters have gathered in Paris and other cities for a fifth consecutive Saturday of demonstrations.
Protesters defied a government call to suspend the action following Tuesday's attack on Strasbourg's Christmas market where a gunman killed four people.
However, fewer people turned up - 66,000 altogether, officials said, compared to 125,000 last Saturday.
The movement, initially against a rise in fuel taxes, now addresses other issues, including education reforms.
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