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Protesters angry over French President Emmanuel Macron’s pension reforms continued with scattered actions on Friday, as unrest across the country prompted officials to postpone a planned state visit by King Charles.
Although there were no major protests planned for Friday, train traffic slowed, lines of trucks blocked access to Marseille’s commercial port and debris still littered the streets of Paris after mass demonstrations the previous day.
More than 450 protesters were arrested in Paris and on Thursday as some 300 demonstrations drew more than a million people nationwide to protest against unpopular pension reforms.
Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said that 441 policemen and gendarmes were injured because violence marred some marches.
He said 1,000 rubbish bins were set on fire in the French capital during the previous day’s action. In the midst of a week-long strike by garbage collectors, the trash can has become a symbol of protest.
Macron’s office announced that the state visit by the King was postponed. He had been scheduled to arrive in France on Sunday on his first state visit as monarch, before heading to Germany on Wednesday. The German part of the trip is still in progress.
The Bordeaux city hall building was set on fire
The union called for new protests and strikes on Tuesday, the day King Charles is scheduled to visit Bordeaux. The heavy wooden doors of Bordeaux’s elegant city hall were destroyed by fire on Thursday night by people taking part in an illegal demonstration.
The mayor of Bordeaux, Pierre Hurmic, said on Friday that he had “difficulty understanding the significance of this act of vandalism.”
Fuel supplies to Paris by the large Gonfreville-L’Orcher refinery in Normandy resumed on Friday after police intervention, according to Energy Transition Minister Agnes Pannier-Runacher. But at the Fos-sur-mer oil terminal near Marseille, protesters gathered to plan a future blockade of the oil refinery.
Fearing disruption in the coming days as the action continues, France’s Civil Aviation Authority asked for a third of flights to be canceled on Sunday at Paris’s second airport, Orly, with 20 percent canceled on Monday.
The protest gained support from outside France’s borders. In Greece, hundreds of protesters gathered outside the French Embassy in Athens on Thursday in a show of solidarity.
Protesters chanted slogans and held placards that read: “Macron, your democracy depends on nine votes” and “From Greece: victory for French workers.”
WATCH | Demonstrations, some violent, continued in several cities:
Protests over pension reforms in France have brought trade, transport and daily life to a standstill across the country. President Emmanuel Macron is facing the biggest challenge of his political career over a new law that increases the age at which people can collect public pensions.
Macron said the bill to increase the retirement age from 62 to 64 was necessary to preserve the financial system, as the country spends more on the pension system than its Western peers.
The government, which survived a pair of no-confidence votes this week, also said it had been negotiating for months with unions and opposition parties to reach an amicable agreement on pension reform, but to no avail.
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