Thousands of arrests, hundreds of schools closed and dozens of teachers attacked as French student riots escalate
Por Maira Butt — – World RSS Feed
Thousands of arrests, hundreds of schools closed and dozens of teachers attacked as French student riots escalate
Around 2,000 people have been arrested as buildings are torched and police officer beaten in growing protests against school conditions
Maira Butt Friday 02 October 2026 14:10 BST
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Thousands of people have been arrested, more than 500 schools closed and dozens of teachers have been attacked as student protests in France continue to grow.
Violent demonstrations against teacher shortages and dilapidated school buildings have seen a school building being set on fire and teenagers, teachers and police officers injured.
Footage shared by the Daily Mail appears to show a gang of students chasing a policewoman holding a teargas canister down a street where she is then kicked and beaten.
open image in gallery
open image in galleryThe BBC reported that teenagers have suffered eye injuries and at least one has lost teeth in the uproar. A teacher in Angers was reportedly struck on the head with an iron bar by attackers who were not from the school.
Police arrested 1,949 people on Thursday alone according to France’s education minister Edouard Geffray. At least 65 school staff have been injured including 40 headteachers in the unrest.
In a government crisis meeting held on Thursday, the country’s intelligence agencies said that the demonstrations had been initiated by hard-left politicians including members of La France Insoumise (LFI), according to a person close to the prime minister.
LFI lawmaker Louis Boyard denied the claim in comments to French broadcasters.
open image in gallery
open image in galleryGeffray said on Thursday evening that he would meet representatives of staff unions, parent associations and student associations on Friday. He conceded that the demands of students were “legitimate”.
France’s justice minister Gerald Darmanin said that there are elements involved in the unrest that do not appear to be high school students.
This “active and violent minority” have contributed to the escalation in violence he said.
“We’re not entirely sure that they are even high school students themselves,” he told France’s RTL radio, adding that two-thirds of the people arrested have been placed in police custody.
“We have gone from high-school student demonstrations to a public order disturbance. When people target buses and set schools on fire, it is no longer simply a protest issue.”
open image in gallery
open image in gallerySome of the worst unrest on Thursday was reported in Marseilles, the country’s second largest city.
Student protesters started fires in at least two high schools on Thursday and at least one car was torched in Strasbourg in the east and riot police clashed with youths in Toulouse in the southwest.
The prosecutor’s office said that teachers had been assaulted and “doused in petrol” at the city’s Victor Hugo high school with two teachers inadvertently splashed with petrol as a student attempted to throw gasoline into a bin.
Outside Marseille’s Saint-Exupery high school, hundreds of young people forced firefighters to flee their truck and then set it alight. Public transport in the city was suspended after staff members were injured in the unrest.
A school was set ablaze in the western city of Nantes, fire crews said, and the facade of another suffered fire damage in Le Havre in the north.
In the Parisian suburb of Saint-Denis, crowds of young people massed in front of a line of police and one student held up a sign that read: “Can we explain ourselves without being teargassed?”
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