Burning cars, tear gas in France pensions protests

French youths battled riot police, truckers blocked roads and filling stations ran dry as protests escalated yesterday against President Nicolas Sarkozy’s plan to raise the retirement age from 60 to 62.

Police fired tear gas and rubber bullets at youths who set a car on fire, smashed bus stops and hurled rocks outside a school in Nanterre, near Paris, blocked by students protesting Mr Sarkozy’s pensions reform.

Youths threw petrol bombs at police outside a school in another Paris suburb, Combes-la-Ville, police said. In Lyon, hooded youngsters burned at least three cars they had overturned during clashes with riot police.

The interior ministry said police arrested 196 rioters in various towns, and that four police officers had been injured in the scuffles.

Nearly 300 schools were disrupted by protests, officials said, and cities across France saw students take part in fresh street demonstrations, several of which saw police arresting rampaging youths.

Meanwhile, truck drivers also joined the movement that has brought millions onto the streets in recent weeks, and rubbish continued to pile up in the streets of Marseille due to a strike by collectors.

“We now need to block the economy to force the government to withdraw its plan,” said Vincent Duse, a CGT union leader at an auto factory in Mulhouse.

Truckers staged go-slows on motorways near Paris and several provincial cities and drivers blocked access to goods supply depots and joined oil workers blocking fuel depots to defend their right to retire at 60.

“The aim was to show we were capable of mobilising people and of blocking a major artery,” said CFDT union leader Didier Bonte, whose members staged a go-slow on the A1 motorway from Lille in the north.

Production at all France’s oil refineries remained shut down since last week, causing filling stations to run dry.

Another day of mass strikes and nationwide protest rallies is planned for today and the unions are hoping to match a series of previous days of action that brought more than a million marchers into the streets.

Half of all flights to and from Paris Orly airport and 30 per cent of flights at Roissy-Charles de Gaulle and other French airports will be cancelled due to today’s strikes, aviation officials said.