Paris under siege: Fourth weekend of riots begins with a deluge of tear gas
In the fourth weekend of wild scenes and rioting, Paris police have blitzed yellow-vested protesters with tear gas and as they attempted to march on the French presidential palace.
As shops closed and tourist attractions, including the Eiffel Tower and Louvre, were cordoned off, police met the surging mob with a wall of shields and managed to foil the protesters’ advance.
When a group of a few hundred broke from the main body and took side streets in a bid to circumvent the police blockade, police fired back with tear gas.
But elsewhere in the French capital and in scores of towns across the country the demonstrations were simmering just short of boiling over as the protest movement stepped up its demand that President Emmanuel Macron resign.
Most of the protesters remain peaceful, and there are no signs so far of the rioting and looting that marked a similar protest last Saturday and prompted fears of greater violence this week.
Crowds were also gathering around the Bastille plaza – the symbolic location were the French Revolution began more than 200 years ago.
Authorities had already detained 343 people on Saturday amid exceptional security measures.
Police are searching people throughout central Paris, confiscating potential weapons that have included hammers, screwdrivers, knives and slingshots.
They have also confiscated goggles and gas masks from journalists who use them to protect against tear gas.
Hundreds of people gathered early on Saturday around the Arc de Triomphe, which was damaged in rioting a week ago.
They then started walking peacefully down the famous avenue, lined with high-end shops normally bustling before the Christmas holidays but now boarded up amid worries of more looting.
President Macron’s government has deployed 89,000 security forces around the country.
Macron announced earlier this week that planned hikes in petrol and diesel taxes, which sparked the protest movement, would be cancelled.
But some protest leaders insisted rallies would go ahead over wider demands including tax cuts and salary rises.
The yellow vest protest movement is also crossing borders, with demonstrations planned in neighbouring Belgium and the Netherlands.
Hundreds of police officers were mobilized in Brussels on Saturday, where yellow vest protesters last week clashed with police and torched two police vehicles. More than 70 people were detained.
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