Headteacher doused in petrol and schools set ablaze during protests in France
A headteacher was injured and fires broke out at schools in Marseille and Nantes as student protests over staff shortages and dilapidated buildings escalated.
Marseille, France. Attackers doused a headteacher in petrol and started fires at at least two schools on Thursday, officials said, as student protests over staff shortages and dilapidated buildings grew increasingly violent across France.
Attacks in Marseille and Nantes
Hundreds of young people surrounded a fire truck that arrived on Thursday morning to extinguish a blaze at Marseille’s Saint-Exupery high school, police said. Attackers forced firefighters to flee the vehicle before setting it alight.
The headteacher at Victor Hugo high school in the same city was attacked and suffered injuries, the prosecutor’s office said, without providing further details.
Fire crews also reported a blaze at a school in the western city of Nantes.
Government holds crisis meeting
The demonstrations and blockades began last week and have become a political flashpoint at a sensitive time for the government, which announced a series of deeply unpopular spending cuts in its 2027 budget on Thursday.
Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu’s office held a crisis meeting on Thursday afternoon to discuss the protests. Officials have said dozens of people have been injured and hundreds arrested, most of them teenagers.
Dispute over policing and access to education
In the Parisian suburb of Saint-Denis, crowds of young people gathered in front of a line of police. One student held a sign reading: “Can we explain ourselves without being teargassed?”
Students have accused police of using heavy-handed tactics, including teargas. The government has criticised violence during some protests while saying that difficulties in high schools should be acknowledged and addressed.
Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said troublemakers were moving between schools in some places to incite violence.
Education Minister Edouard Geffray called on schools to hold classes remotely if protesters blocked their premises.
“Violence will not keep our students from their fundamental right to an education,” he said in a post on social media platform X.
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