‘Violence, clashes and damage’: Student protests in France leave hundreds injured, about 2,000 arrested - National Post
Anti-riot police face off with student protesters at a blockade at the Lycee Kerichen secondary school in Brest, France, on Oct. 1, 2026. Photo by FRED TANNEAU/AFP via Getty ImagesArticle contentPARIS, France — French students set fire to bins and erected blockades outside schools in several cities, protesting overcrowded classrooms, teacher shortages and crumbling facilities.
Several school principals were injured, harassed or assaulted during blockades at high schools on Thursday, according to reports from regional education authorities, prefectures and union representatives.
Police have already detained hundreds of protesters at the lycees, which students aged 15 to 18 attend for their final three years of secondary education in France.
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The interior ministry said police and gendarmes had made 1,949 arrests on Thursday, while 305 officers had been injured.
According to interior ministry figures, 1,027 lycees of the 3,700 across France had been affected by the movement’s actions, with blockades at 222 of them.
The authorities in the Paris region said around 50 schools had been “the scene of violence, clashes and damage”.
Interior Minister Laurent Nunez condemned what he described as “unbridled violence”.
Manuel Bompard, a leading figure in the hard-left France Unbowed party (LFI), quickly dismissed the claim, accusing the government of “sinking into conspiratorial thinking” in comments to AFP.
LFI leader Jean-Luc Melenchon demanded to know which arm of the intelligence service had said that.
This latest wave of social unrest comes with tensions already running high over inflation, particularly soaring fuel prices — and just seven months away from France’s presidential election, where opinion polls suggest far-right leader Marine Le Pen is the frontrunner.
A student protester adds to a burning blockade outside a secondary school in Aubervilliers, north of Paris, France, on Oct. 1, 2026. Photo by LOU BENOIST/AFP via Getty ImagesArticle contentSince last week, pupils have staged protests outside schools over a range of grievances. They range from timetables, class sizes and a shortage of teachers to overheated classrooms during this year’s heatwaves.
The protests have spread across the country from the Paris suburbs.
Riot police have lined up against the students, and the force has launched internal probes after accusations of brutality against three pupils, said Interior Minister Laurent Nunez.
University students also joined in Thursday, blocking access to around 30 campuses, a student union said.
Among reports of school staff being targeted was one incident in the southern port city of Marseille when a school principal and his deputy were splashed with petrol. A journalist with TV channel M6 was attacked at the same school, local officials said.
