PARIS: Thousands of “yellow vest” protesters returned to the streets of France Saturday to protest against President Emmanuel Macron’s policies, clashing with police in several cities in a challenge to his bid to quell the movement.
Police fired tear gas and water cannon to push back protesters at Place de la Bastille in Paris, one of the regular protest areas, as some demonstrators threw stones from a building site.
The local prefecture reported 223 arrests in Paris, while the interior ministry estimated numbers for the 11th week of protests were at 69,000 across France, compared with 84,000 last Saturday.
The demonstrations erupted in mid-November over Macron’s economic reforms, but have since grown into a wider rallies calling for the resignation of the former investment banker who critics say is out of touch with the economic struggles of ordinary French people.
In Paris and other cities, the yellow vest movement had called for the protests to continue into the night.
But police quickly dispersed several hundred protesters in the capital’s symbolic Republique square, using stun grenades as well as tear gas and water cannon to clear the area, AFP journalists said.
Clashes erupted too in Nantes in western France and in the southern city of Montpellier, where a police officer was injured by “a pyrotechnic device,” said a statement from the local prefecture.
In Paris, the official count was 4,000 demonstrators against 7,000 the previous weekend.
Interior Minister Christophe Castaner on Twitter criticized “rioters disguised as yellow vest protesters” after Saturday’s clashes.
The weekend’s protests against Macron’s tax and social policies came as divisions appeared among the yellow vests — named after the high-visibility vests they wear — as to where to take the movement.
In a new political development, a 31-year-old nurse named Ingrid Levavasseur said this week she would lead a yellow vest list of candidates for the European elections in May.
An initial survey in the wake of the announcement suggested they would garner a respectable 13 percent of the vote.
But not every protester appeared to welcome this development.
“There is a hard core that is ready to keep fighting,” said 42-year-old Gilbert Claro from the Paris suburbs. But the movement “is not meant to be political,” he added.
“We have to keep the pressure on in the streets,” to get their demands accepted, said Virginie, an activist in her 40s who said she had been involved in the protests from the beginning.
She and many other protesters want a citizen-sponsored referendum so ordinary people can have more of a say in government policy.
This idea has been consistently rejected by the government, although Macron made some concessions last December in a bid to end the protests.
Recent opinion polls suggest that he has regained some of the ground lost during the crisis, as he has presented his case in a series of town hall events around the country.
The “great national debate” he initiated in response to the protests has nevertheless been dismissed as a public relations operation by many yellow vest protesters.
The debate is a “masquerade,” said Mathieu Styrna, a 36-year-old carpenter from northern France in Paris for the protests. His impression, he said, was that the participants had been selected.
Outside Paris, several thousand protesters were marching in Bordeaux and Toulouse in the southwest — two of the cities where support for the movement has been consistently strong.
In Bordeaux, police broke up small groups of protesters tossing fireworks and bottles as night fell.
In the Mediterranean port city of Marseille, members of the CGT union joined the protests and about a thousand protesters turned out in the eastern city of Lyon.
For the first time on Saturday, riot police used controversial defense ball launchers (LBDs) that shoot 40-millimeter (1.6-inch) rubber and foam rounds were equipped with cameras.
A French court on Friday refused a bid brought by France’s League for Human Rights (LDH) and the CGT to ban the weapons, blamed for serious injuries suffered by some demonstrators.
The police authority in Paris announced the introduction of cameras in a move for greater transparency.
On Sunday, supporters of the government will stage their first “red scarf” protest to represent what they say is “the silent majority” defending “democracy and its institutions” and denouncing the violence of the yellow vests protests.
Two-thirds of people questioned in a IFOP-Journal du Dimanche survey published Sunday said they thought the demonstrations had not succeeded in changing how Macron was governing France.
‘Yellow vests’ back on France’s streets to challenge Macron
‘Yellow vests’ back on France’s streets to challenge Macron
- The demonstrations erupted in mid-November over Macron’s economic reforms, but have since grown into a wider rallies calling for the resignation of the president
- In Paris, the official count was 4,000 demonstrators against 7,000 the previous weekend
UN Human Rights Chief troubled by ‘heavy-handed’ action against protesters at US colleges
- Volker Turk says ‘freedom of expression and the right to peaceful assembly are fundamental to society, particularly when there is sharp disagreement on major issues’
- Protests have taken place on campuses in several states as students demand colleges withdraw investments from businesses involved in Israel’s assault on Gaza
NEW YORK CITY: The UN’s high commissioner for human rights on Tuesday said he is troubled by “a series of heavy-handed steps” taken by education authorities and law enforcement officials to break up protests at college campuses in the US.
Volker Turk said: “freedom of expression and the right to peaceful assembly are fundamental to society, particularly when there is sharp disagreement on major issues, as there are in relation to the conflict in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and Israel.”
Pro-Palestinian demonstrations have spread across college campuses in Texas, New York, Atlanta, Utah, Virginia, New Jersey, California and other parts of the US as students protest against the death toll during the war in Gaza, call for a ceasefire and demand authorities at their colleges withdraw investments from businesses involved in Israel’s military assault on Gaza.
Though largely peaceful, at some locations the protests have been dispersed or dismantled by security forces. Hundreds of students and teachers have been arrested, some of whom face charges or academic sanctions.
Turk expressed concern that some of the responses by law enforcement authorities at several colleges might have been disproportionate, and called for such actions to be scrutinized to ensure they do not exceed what is necessary “to protect the rights and freedoms of others.”
He added that all such actions must be guided by human rights law, while “allowing vibrant debate and protecting safe spaces for all.”
He reiterated that antisemitic, anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian activities and speech are “totally unacceptable, deeply disturbing (and) reprehensible.” However, the conduct of protesters must be assessed and addressed individually rather than through “sweeping measures that impute to all members of a protest the unacceptable viewpoints of a few,” Turk added.
“Incitement to violence or hatred on grounds of identity or viewpoints, whether real or assumed, must be strongly repudiated. We have already seen such dangerous rhetoric can quickly lead to real violence.”
Poland says it is probing alleged links between Orlen unit’s ex-CEO and ‘terrorist organizations’
- Polish website Onet had reported on Monday that the former CEO of Orlen Trading Switzerland was suspected by Orlen’s internal security unit of having had contacts with Hezbollah
- The ex-CEO denied in an interview with Polish private radio RMF on Tuesday that he had any connections with Hezbollah
WARSAW: Poland has launched an investigation into multi-million-dollar cash losses by Polish refiner Orlen’s Swiss unit and allegations that its former CEO had ties to “terrorist organizations,” Warsaw chief prosecutor Malgorzata Adamajtys said on Tuesday.
Polish website Onet had reported on Monday that the former CEO of Orlen Trading Switzerland, referred to only as Samer A. due to local privacy laws, was suspected by Orlen’s internal security unit of having had contacts with Lebanon’s powerful Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group.
Samer A., the ex-CEO of Orlen’s Swiss subsidiary OTS, denied in an interview with Polish private radio RMF on Tuesday that he had any connections with Hezbollah.
“I have been to Poland many times, I am a Polish citizen, I have a Polish passport. I am treated by the current authorities as a second-class citizen,” he said, adding that though he was currently abroad, he was not hiding from Polish law enforcement.
Asked at a press conference for details of the investigation, chief prosecutor Adamajtys said: “We are looking into all information, some of which is known to prosecutors from the press, radio and television, including on connections with terrorist organizations.”
Western countries including the US designate Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. The European Union classifies Hezbollah’s military wing as a terrorist group, but not its political wing.
Adamajtys said OTS was established as a business despite a warning by Orlen’s internal security unit not to do so. It operated, according to Adamajtys, without proper supervision, documentation and verification of contractors. She said this showed that Samer A. should not have been appointed as CEO.
“A person who makes advance payments without completion of the first tranches of certain deliveries is not a good CEO and should not be the CEO of this or any other company,” she said.
Reuters sought to contact Samer A. for comment on Adamajtys’ remarks about OTS operations, but he could not be reached. In his conversation with RMF, he denied that there had been any warning from Orlen’s internal security unit.
OTS LOSSES
Orlen has said OTS was behind the loss of around $400 million linked to contracts to buy Venezuelan oil and oil products.
OTS has said it tried to benefit from a temporary window in US sanctions against Venezuela and paid cash advances to intermediaries it never worked with before. The contracts were canceled, it said, as a closure of the window was nearing, and tankers weren’t loading.
Orlen has said it is currently auditing OTS operations.
Adamajtys said Orlen also faced questions over the alleged manipulation of fuel prices to artificially low levels ahead of last year’s national election and a sale of some assets that investigators suspect were below market level.
In February, Orlen rejected an allegation of below-market asset sales from the state audit office, saying it gained as much as 9 billion zloty ($2.2 billion) in one corporate merger. The company also denied lowering fuel prices artificially.
Samer A. has been charged in a separate probe with VAT fraud between 2008-2013, a regional prosecutor in Bydgoszcz said on Monday. He was detained by police and questioned by a prosecutor in February, and released on bail, the prosecutor added.
Opposition critics said that under the previous, nationalist Law and Justice (PiS) government, which lost power in that vote, Orlen had helped financed the party’s policy agenda, including taking control of some media outlets.
On Monday, Prime Minister Donald Tusk said he had called the country’s chief prosecutor and secret services coordinator to discuss potential links between the former CEO of Orlen, Daniel Obajtek, and Hezbollah.
Obajtek, a close associate of PiS leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski, responded on social media platform X that Tusk was “looking for scandals where there are none.”
Polish media have reported that PiS might put up Obajtek as a candidate in June’s European Parliament election.
Forest fires raze parts of India amid heat, dry weather
- As of 2021, 54.4 percent of forests in India experienced occasional fires, most of them due to man-made factors
- These fires have picked up again this year, with 653 incidents in Uttarakhand alone, government data shows
NEW DELHI: Frequent fires are razing forests in India’s Uttarakhand state in the north and Odisha in the east amid high temperatures and long dry spells, and the blazes have been worsened by people burning the forest to collect a flower used to brew alcohol.
Data from the state-run Forest Survey of India shows that as of 2021, 54.4 percent of forests in India experienced occasional fires, most of them due to man-made factors.
“Agriculture stubble burning, misconceptions and burning of shrubs to shoo away wildlife are major reasons behind the forest fires,” Swapnil Aniruddh, a forest official in Uttarakhand, told Reuters.
After a brief respite during the previous season from November to April, forest fires have picked up again this year, with 653 incidents in Uttarakhand alone, government data shows.
Odisha’s fires have been exacerbated by people setting parts of the forest ablaze to collect Mahua flowers, which are highly sought after as they are used to brew a popular liquor.
During the current season, 10,163 fire points in Uttarakhand have been detected using the government’s imaging radiometer.
Overall, loss of significant forest cover is a big worry for India as it tries to dramatically reduce its climate-changing emissions.
Among the organizations helping to curb the fires is the Indian Air Force, which has used the aerial firefighting ‘Bambi Bucket’ technique of collecting water from a nearby lake to spray over the region.
The situation may get worse, with India’s weather department predicting more heat-wave days than normal between April and June this year, along with a longer dry spell for Uttarakhand.
Pentagon chief pushes for donation of more Patriot systems to Kyiv
- “There are countries that have Patriots, and so what we’re doing is continuing to engage those countries,” Austin told a House Armed Services Committee hearing
WASHINGTON: US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Tuesday he has been encouraging countries with Patriot missile systems to donate them to Ukraine, which has appealed for more of the air defense batteries.
“There are countries that have Patriots, and so what we’re doing is continuing to engage those countries,” Austin told a House Armed Services Committee hearing.
“I have talked to the leaders of several countries... myself here in the last two weeks, encouraging them to give up more capability or provide more capability,” he said, without identifying the countries by name.
Various European Union countries possess the systems, including Spain, Greece, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland and Sweden.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told NATO members earlier this month that his country needed a minimum of seven additional Patriot or other high-end air defense systems to counter Russian air strikes, urging them to step up their military assistance for Kyiv.
Greek court drops criminal charges against 35 international aid workers
- The case was dropped due to inadequate evidence
- Greece was on the front line of a huge surge of refugees and migrants to Europe in 2015 and 2016
ATHENS: Greece has dropped criminal charges against dozens of international aid workers, ranging from spying to facilitating what authorities had called illegal entry into the country through the island of Lesbos, court documents showed on Tuesday.
Most of the 35 people, accused in 2020 of setting up a criminal organization and providing support to traffickers ferrying migrants, were German nationals. The rest included people from Norway, Austria, France, Spain, Switzerland and Bulgaria. They were arrested and had denied wrongdoing at the time.
The case was dropped due to inadequate evidence, the documents seen by Reuters showed.
“The detailed investigation of the case file has resoundingly quashed the police narrative which was pure fiction,” said Zaharias Kesses, a lawyer representing some of the aid workers.
Greece was on the front line of a huge surge of refugees and migrants to Europe in 2015 and 2016, many through its outlying islands close to Turkiye, including Lesbos. That flow has since ebbed.
The case was based on a 2020 operation by the Greek intelligence service EYP and the anti-terrorism unit with the code name Alkmini, and involved undercover agents who traveled as migrants from Turkiye to Lesbos.
Greek intelligence services were initially involved because the workers, who were using an alarm phone for migrants and asylum seekers in need of rescue at sea, were thought to have passed on information on Greek coast guard movements and vessel equipment.
But a magistrate’s investigation concluded the information and visual material collected were not confidential.
“There is not enough evidence to support the accusations against the defendants,” the documents said.
