What could possibly go wrong?
More:French Police Crack Down on ‘Yellow Vests’ With Tear Gas and Over a Thousand Arrests
PARIS — A fourth weekend of antigovernment protests in France turned violent again on Saturday, with demonstrators in Paris burning cars and ripping down barricades from store fronts, while the riot police fired tear gas and water cannons to control the crowds.
The so-called Yellow Vests descended on the capital by the thousands, even as the police turned out in force, blocking off roads and monuments.
Nearly 1,400 people were arrested nationwide. In Paris, many were detained before they could even reach the central site of the demonstrations along Paris’s main artery, the Champs-Élysées.
The huge police presence in the capital — absent last Saturday — appeared far more able to contain the violence. The show of force reflected a change from preceding weeks, with law enforcement often engaging with the vandals before they could act.
“The situation is under control even though there are still some hot spots in the provinces,” Interior Minister Christophe Castaner said Saturday evening.
“The escalation of violence has been brought to a stopping point,” he added, crediting the more mobile strategy of the police. The violence, while contained, was “totally unacceptable,” he said.
The minister said 118 demonstrators and 17 police officers were injured nationwide on Saturday. Last week, about 200 protesters were injured, as well as more than 200 police officers, the interior ministry said.
Since the demonstrations began four weeks ago, four people have died.
The Yellow Vests take their name from the fluorescent hazard vests adopted by the protesters as a sign of their economic distress.
Initially, their ranks were filled by members of the working poor from rural areas and urban outskirts, who were dismayed by a planned increase in a fuel tax, which the government canceled this past week in a retreat.
But that did not quell the outrage, which has morphed into much broader anger at President Emmanuel Macron’s economic policies, and France’s declining living standards.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/08/worl ... -vest.html
And the mayhem is spreading:
http://time.com/5474753/yellow-vest-pro ... therlands/Yellow Vest Protests Grow in Belgium and The Netherlands
(BRUSSELS) — Belgian police fired tear gas and water cannons at yellow-vested protesters calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Charles Michel after they tried to breach a riot barricade, as the movement that started in France made its mark Saturday in Belgium and the Netherlands.
Protesters in Brussels threw paving stones, road signs, fireworks, flares and other objects at police blocking their entry to an area where Michel’s offices, other government buildings and the parliament are located.
Brussels police spokeswoman Ilse Van de Keere said that around 400 protesters were gathered in the area.
About 100 were detained, many for carrying dangerous objects like fireworks or clothing that could be used as protection in clashes with police.
The reasons for the protests are not entirely clear. Neither Belgium nor the Netherlands has proposed a hike in fuel tax — the catalyst for the massive and destructive demonstrations in France in recent weeks.
Instead, protesters appeared to hail at least in part from a populist movement that is angry at government policy in general and what it sees as the widening gulf between mainstream politicians and the voters who put them in power. Some in Belgium appeared intent only on confronting police.