{"id":236286,"date":"2016-04-06T12:23:39","date_gmt":"2016-04-06T12:23:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=236286"},"modified":"2016-04-06T12:23:56","modified_gmt":"2016-04-06T12:23:56","slug":"hundreds-arrested-french-police-assault-student-protests-labour-reform","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/hundreds-arrested-french-police-assault-student-protests-labour-reform\/","title":{"rendered":"Hundreds arrested as French police assault student protests against labour reform"},"content":{"rendered":"

Alex Lantier and Senthooran Ravee<\/p>\n

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After more than a million workers and youth marched Thursday in defiance of the state of emergency to protest Socialist Party (PS) labour minister Myriam El Khomri\u2019s law, security forces yesterday violently attacked continuing demonstrations against the reactionary labour law reform.<\/p>\n

Explosive anger is developing among broad sections of workers and youth to the El Khomri Law. It would increase the working day by up to two hours, undermine job security for young workers, and allow the trade unions and businesses to negotiate deals violating France\u2019s Labour Code. This nakedly pro-business bill has provoked anger and revulsion among broad layers of workers hostile to unpopular PS president Fran\u00e7ois Hollande.<\/p>\n

Police responded with a violent and bloody crackdown against a number of protests across France yesterday. In many cities, the trade unions made little or no effort to mobilise workers in support of the university or high school student protests. Police attacked them violently, trying to intimidate youth in the run-up to the next major protest by workers and students, called for April 9.<\/p>\n

\"\"A section of the demonstration<\/div>\n

In Lyon, a few union officials attended the student protest. Police blocked the protest\u2014prompting shouts of \u201cState of emergency, police state!\u201d\u2014and only authorised the march to begin \u201cgiven that the situation is under the control of the trade union organisations.\u201d Several students were arrested or hit with batons as clashes erupted between police and demonstrators towards the end of the march, with one student taken away in handcuffs and another heavily beaten with batons.<\/p>\n

In Paris, some 130 protesters were detained by security forces during a student protest that left from Nation Square. In the run-up to the march from Nation Square, as well as at the rally called by student and trade unions on Bastille Square later in the afternoon, large numbers of plainclothes police could be seen discussing tactics with riot police before leaving to blend into the crowd.<\/p>\n

Numerous squads of riot police surrounded the protesters after they left Nation Square, split the protest march in two, and then charged the protesters from behind, attacking them and hitting several journalists with their batons. They detained the protesters supposedly for \u201cidentification\u201d purposes.<\/p>\n

WSWS reporters spoke to protesters at the Nation and Bastille Square protests. At Bastille, the WSWS spoke to Ada, who is working towards a technical high school degree and has an internship at a factory. \u201cI\u2019m opposed to the law to defend the workers and also the future for us, the students,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Asked what she thought the impact of the law would be, she said, \u201cI think we will be under ever-stricter rules, because conditions for those of us not working on permanent contracts will be shit. It will separate us more from those with permanent contracts. \u2026 We will be each on our own sides, and that is ridiculous because we should be all together.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ada opposed lengthening the working day under the terms of the law, saying that there was already not enough work to go around due to the economic crisis: \u201cI have an internship at a factory and there isn\u2019t enough work to do. Workers are forced to come in seven hours per day, otherwise they are not paid. So they don\u2019t have enough work to do, and they sit around getting pissed off and doing nothing for seven hours, but at least they have a job. So if they lengthen working hours, we will be wasting our time even more because there isn\u2019t enough work to go around.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Many students took part in the demonstrations<\/div>\n

Asked about the state of emergency, Ada said, \u201cIt\u2019s ridiculous\u2026for example, if someone is unarmed and [police] think that they might do something harmful, they can hit this person for no reason, and I find that ridiculous. Also, they can enter into people\u2019s houses without a warrant, but everyone has a right to a private life.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ada criticised the presence of police at demonstrations. \u201cI find it very stressful. It leads to all sorts of tensions,\u201d she said. \u201cThe youth get angrier when there are policemen everywhere. It produces bad blood, we are surrounded and don\u2019t have the right to leave the march for any reason. Once you\u2019re marching, if you need to leave or if you want to stop in a caf\u00e9, you get attacked for no reason.<\/p>\n

\u201cI saw a guy who got carted off by the cops,\u201d she added. \u201cI feared for him, because I didn\u2019t want them to hit him. I knew that if I stayed in front of him, they might not hit him because I would be there to watch and then to tell them that they can\u2019t hit people like that for no reason.\u201d<\/p>\n

The WSWS also spoke to a group of students from Sophie Germain high school who were protesting at Nation Square. They said, \u201cNow it\u2019s a month that we\u2019ve been protesting, and it\u2019s become about much more than simply the labour law reform. It\u2019s against all the consequences of this government over the last several years.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked what they opposed, they said, \u201cFirst there is the labour law itself\u2014some of its stipulations cannot be allowed, like limiting fines [for illegal mass sackings by employers]. Some of them will be modified under pressure from the demonstrations.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another student added, \u201cMore generally, it\u2019s against all the empty talk of the politicians. They say we will do this or that to help the youth. Hollande said that one of his projects is the youth, but what has he done? He dictates laws that will not help our future.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"A sign reads \u201cstate of emergency means police state\u201d<\/div>\n

The students were divided about the state of emergency, with one saying its goal is \u201cto ensure the security of the population, but it should not be abused.\u201d Another student attacked it as \u201ca pretext to do other things that are convenient for the government,\u201d a sentiment echoed by the third student, who said it \u201callows for passing all sorts of other things that they want. For example, they use it to limit protests, supposedly because there is a state of emergency we cannot go protest, which is totally stupid.\u201d<\/p>\n

The WSWS also spoke to Nathan, who said he hoped that protests would continue \u201cthroughout the spring\u2026the whole spring we should be in struggle.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cA general strike is developing in the universities, high schools, and work places, though not necessarily in offices in some places. I want to send a strong signal to the workers. \u2026 We can win if we stay united,\u201d he said, though he complained that \u201cno political party is proposing a general strike.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked about the role of the PS, he said, \u201cIt\u2019s been a long time that they betrayed us, so it\u2019s not a surprise that they betrayed us now. They are part of the system. \u2026 In fact, they carry out right-wing policies, so what\u2019s happening is not surprising.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said that French society is becoming \u201cmore severe and with more law-and-order hysteria\u201d and warned against \u201cbombing and massacring populations in the Middle East.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBehind the state of emergency, there is the state and big business. It\u2019s to increase the power they have to repress social opposition. We have to consider this struggle very carefully, these are methods of big business to violently attack social protest.\u201d<\/p>\n

Via WSWS<\/a>. This piece was reprinted by RINF Alternative News<\/a> with permission or license.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Alex Lantier and Senthooran Ravee After more than a million workers and youth marched Thursday in defiance of the state of emergency to protest Socialist Party (PS) labour minister Myriam El Khomri\u2019s law, security forces yesterday violently attacked continuing demonstrations against the reactionary labour law reform. Explosive anger is developing among broad sections of workers […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519,18],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-236286","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-newswire","7":"category-latest-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236286","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=236286"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236286\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=236286"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=236286"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=236286"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}