Woman dies as car rams French farmers’ roadblock
France: A car rammed into a roadblock put up by protesting farmers in southwestern France on Tuesday, killing a woman and seriously injuring her husband and teenage daughter stationed there.
The three occupants of the car that crashed into the barrier were taken into police custody.
The incident occurred in the Ariege department in the southwestern Occitanie region which has been a focal point of farmers’ protests in recent days. It came a day after farming union representatives met with Prime Minister Gabriel Attal to discuss their grievances, including low food prices, rising charges for farmers, higher fuel prices and environmental protection rules that they say are unacceptable.
The woman was a member of the powerful FNSEA farmers union which has been leading nationwide protests, as are her husband and daughter.
Tensions have been running high, with the FNSEA announcing protests all this week and beyond if the government failed to respond to its demands.
FNSEA president Arnaud Rousseau, who first reported the incident, said no further details were available for now.
“In the current circumstances that farming is living through, this kind of drama is difficult to bear,” he said.
A police source said that the car drove into the barrier “at speed”. The woman killed was in her 30s and her husband in his 40s.
At his meeting with the farming representatives Monday night, Attal promised that a number of measures would be announced by the end of the week, according to Agriculture Minister Marc Fesneau.