About 8,000 officers and 14 armoured vehicles have been
deployed in the French capital for the fifth consecutive weekend of
demonstrations. At least 21 people were detained on Saturday morning.
Gilets jaunes
protesters turn out in Paris for fifth weekend
Gilets jaunes protesters take to the streets of Paris for
fifth weekend
About 8,000 police deployed amid demonstrations over
economic injustice
Kim Willsher in Paris
Sat 15 Dec 2018 16.53 GMT First published on Sat 15 Dec 2018
11.28 GMT
France saw a fifth weekend of protests by defiant gilets
jaunes (yellow vests) who ignored government calls to stay home following this
week’s attack on Strasbourg’s Christmas market.
In Paris hundreds gathered at the Champs-Elysées and at
Place de l’Opéra, though the authorities said the numbers were well down on
previous weeks.
At both sites, demonstrators found themselves facing a
massive show of strength from the security services. Protesters were searched as
riot police, gendarmes with armoured vehicles, mounted police and plainclothed
police encircled, refusing to allow them to disperse en masse down spur roads.
Some gilets jaunes attempted to bring a festive note to the
gatherings; at Opéra there was a Santa gilet jaune and another protester
dressed as a cockerel. On the Champs-Elysées, members of a nude performance
group painted silver and wearing red Phrygian caps – a symbol of liberty and
the republic – engaged in a silent face-off with riot police.
It has been a long week for Emmanuel Macron who, hours after
trying to defuse the most explosive crisis of his 18 months in office by making
concessions to the gilets jaunes, was dealing with a suspected terrorist attack
on Strasbourg’s celebrated Christmas market.
On Tuesday, a sombre Macron, accused by gilets jaunes of
being arrogant and out of touch, announced a €15bn (£13.4bn) package of
concessions including a rise in the minimum wage in a televised address to the
nation.
Twenty-four hours later in Strasbourg, a 29-year-old man
shot at crowds and stabbed passersby, killing four and injuring a dozen others.
The suspect disappeared for 48 hours before being spotted in a south-east
district of the city and was shot dead by police.
The government had asked protesters to suspend their planned
“Act Five” in the wake of the Strasbourg attack. On Saturday, across the
country, thousands ignored it.
Hélène Dejesse, 60, an artist, had travelled from Charente
in south-west France to attend Saturday’s protest in Paris, saying she was “not
interested” in Macron’s concessions.
“We’re not letting anything go … I’m here today and I’ll be
protesting over Christmas and as long as it takes. For 40 years I have worked
and have had a hatred of the state. As a freelancer, I have the right to pay
taxes and get nothing back in return. The state has crushed us. When this
movement started I saw it as a means of expressing that hatred,” she said.
“There would have been many more of us here, but they were
stopping gilets jaunes from getting on the train. They will say the movement is
running out of steam, but that’s because people couldn’t get here.”
The gilets jaunes began as a grass-roots movement and was
initially sparked by a new eco-tax, since dropped. It has morphed into a vehicle
for the expression of anti-government and anti-Macron anger.
In past weeks, protests have degenerated into running
battles between protesters and police, and seen fringe elements torch cars,
smash and loot shops and businesses, and deface public monuments.
Without any structure or official leaders, it has been difficult
to establish what gilets jaunes want and who the government can negotiate with.
On Saturday, one branch of the movement La France en Colère
(Angry France) issued widely acclaimed demands for France to be governed by RIC
(Référendum d’Initiative Citoyenne, or Citizens’ Initiative Referendum), for
the French constitution to be rewritten to allow greater political power to the
people and a reduction in tax on essential goods, including food, heating,
water and clothing.
“Our elected representatives need to be controlled when they
betray us,” Dejesse said.
Guillaume Deselly, also an artist from Charentes, blamed the
French government for encouraging protester violence.
“They let the casseurs (vandals) do what they like so they
can discredit the gilets jaunes movement,” he said.
Nurses Sophie Portejoie, 45, Christelle Tesson, 49, health
assistant Virginie Rabaud, 32, and student Ophélie Joaquim, 22, had come in
from the Essonne, just south of Paris.
“We’re pacifists and of course we’re afraid there might be
violence, but we have come anyway, otherwise we will gain nothing in life.
We’re fighting against precarity,” Portejoie said.
“There’s too much injustice between those at the top of
society and those at the bottom.”
Tesson added: “We’re doing this for our children. Mine are
both in work but they have small salaries with which to pay big rents and
charges. It’s one tax after another. We can take no more.”
Speaking from the European council on Friday, Macron called
for an end to the street protests.
“Our country needs calm, needs order, needs to return to
normal,” he said. He called on demonstrators to “sign up to the democratic
process”.
The Paris police prefecture said there were 2,200
demonstrators in Paris on Saturday, well down on previous weeks, and well
outnumbered by the 8,000 members of the security forces.
At Place de l’Opéra there was a minute’s silence for the
victims of the Strasbourg attack.
Outside of Paris, gilets jaunes maintained their protests
and blockades on many roundabouts outside cities and there were demonstrations
in Bordeaux, Marseille and Rennes, though again, police said numbers were well
down.
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