Police raid French university:

Europe

Riot police raided a university in Paris on Friday to evict students who staged a three-week sit-in over new education policies, the latest flashpoint in protests against President Emmanuel Macron’s sweeping reforms.

Around 100 officers took part in the dawn raid on the 22-storey tower block dominating the Tolbiac campus, one of several French faculties occupied in an echo of the momentous student-led protests of May 1968.

Railworkers, civil servants, retirement home workers, lawyers and students have all demonstrated in recent weeks over Macron’s shake-up of public services, but so far have failed to knock him off course.

A day of nationwide protests Thursday drew about 120,000 people, according to the interior ministry, well below the 320,000 counted during the last major demonstrations on March 22 and disappointing those hoping to force a showdown with the government.

Students began occupying campuses in March over a new law that introduces an element of selection for access to university courses for the first time.

The Tolbiac campus, part of Paris 1 university, has been one of the epicentres of the movement.

Some of the students threw bottles and other objects at the police when they moved in on Friday, an AFP journalist at the scene said. One person was arrested on charges of rebellion.

This week the unrest spread to Paris’s prestigious Sciences Po university — Macron’s alma mater — which was taken over by protesters accusing the president of running a “dictatorship”.

But the blockade was lifted Friday, and classes were again being held by the afternoon. (AFP)