France’s revolting students vowed Thursday night they are only getting started and plan to continue their nationwide rioting, blockades, demonstrations and boycotts now and into the foreseeable future.
FRANCE24 reports at least a dozen demonstrations supporting the high school students’ anti-establishment movement were planned across France into Friday after a rally at Place de la Bastille in Paris saw tear gas and a water cannon were fired at protesters.
The mass mobilisation of students in concert with far-left political parties has seen street violence soar to record levels across France in the past three weeks.
Police have made more than 6,600 arrests since late September alone, when students, most of them under 18, began protesting to demand more education funding, as Breitbart News reported.
The education ministry said 375 schools were fully or partially closed Thursday, the FRANCE24 report notes.
In a TV address as cited by the outlet, Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu lamented the “violence, students and staff being attacked, police officers and gendarmes injured, schools set on fire or vandalized, thousands of hours of classes lost, not to mention threats and insults.”
A masked leftist protestor flaunts a Palestinian flag as tear gas is fired by police as tens of thousands of secondary school students and their supporters march from Republic to Nation square on October 6, 2026 in Paris, France. (Guy Smallman/Getty Images)
Tens of thousands of secondary school students and their supporters march from Republic to Nation square on October 6, 2026 in Paris, France. Nationwide student protests and violent school riots have disrupted over 700 secondary schools and led to roughly 5,000 arrests. (Guy Smallman/Getty)
He took aim at “political leaders who use this anger to conduct their electoral battles.”
France goes to the polls for a presidential election in April to select a replacement for departing President Emmanuel Macron.
“We cannot play with the safety of France’s youth”, Lecornu said.
Meanwhile the students say they will go on with the FRANCE24 report noting this threat: “We’re here, we’re demonstrating, and we won’t stop. Until October, November, December if necessary. Nothing will stop us,” said Sofia Ferdials, 18, a student at Paris 8 University.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.