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French School Blockades to Restart from Monday, Student Group Says

A campaign of high school blockades will restart in France from Monday, according to a student group leader, after the government’s proposals were rejected as insufficient.

Pierre Sourzat, head of the “Lyceens!” group, said some high schools will be blockaded from Monday, when students return from a two-week holiday. “It will be more significant from Tuesday, but we know that some schools will be blocked as early as tomorrow,” he told broadcaster RMC on Sunday. “We support all our comrades who are blocking their schools from tomorrow,” he added.

On Saturday, hundreds of thousands of people, including high school and university students, took to the streets across France for a third consecutive weekend of protests. France’s protest movement against soaring prices emerged from weeks of demonstrations by high school students protesting deteriorating learning conditions and inequality.

On Monday, the government announced a series of measures aimed at addressing student protesters’ demands, including replacing the university admissions platform and providing loans for school renovations. Students said the proposals did not go far enough.

On Saturday, Sabrine Kharbach, spokeswoman for the Union Etudiante (Student Union), said blockades of universities and high schools would take place on Tuesday and Thursday.

President Emmanuel Macron has called for classes to resume in a calm manner, arguing that “young people have been heard”. Sourzat countered that “the president hasn’t listened to us”. “It’s smoke and mirrors,” he said. “There’s a bit of polish on the surface, but once you scratch beneath it, there’s nothing there.”

Sourzat said the proposed overhaul of the university admissions platform, long criticised for its lack of transparency, failed to address the shortage of places in higher education. He also dismissed the government’s plan to reduce class sizes as insufficient, noting that it would apply only to 10th-grade classes. “We were asking for all year groups,” he said.

With the eurozone’s second-largest economy on the brink of recession and under pressure to rein in its debt, the government has limited scope to appease student protesters through additional spending.


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