Sun 13 February 2022:
On Saturday, shortly after a “Freedom Convoy” protesting COVID-19 restrictions arrived in Paris, French police shot tear gas at demonstrators on the Champs Elysees avenue.
Protesters in cars managed to slip through police checks in central Paris, causing traffic to bottleneck around the Arc de Triomphe monument.
The vehicles brandished French flags and honked in defiance of a police order not to enter the city, inspired by horn-blaring “Freedom Convoy” rallies in Canada.
As some protestors climbed onto their vehicles in the middle of the roundabout at the top of the Champs Elysees, police advised them to move on.
Earlier in the day, police said they had stopped 500 vehicles attempting to enter Paris and had issued roughly 300 tickets to their occupants by mid-morning.
With a presidential election less than two months away, President Emmanuel Macron’s government is keen to avoid large-scale rallies like the anti-government “yellow vest” protests of 2018.
Canadian truckers protesting a vaccine mandate for trans-border traffic have paralysed parts of the capital Ottawa since late January and blocked US-Canada crossing points.
The French protests are against rules requiring a vaccine pass to enter many public places and come after months of regular demonstrations against the pass in Paris and other cities.
Police have allowed two street marches by anti-vaccine and yellow vest demonstrators to go ahead in Paris on Saturday afternoon.
“Love & Freedom, No Dictatorship”
Protests are rising all around the world, not just in France. A “freedom convoy” of dozens of trucks and other vehicles, ranging from tractors to a car hauling a trailer, arrived in The Hague, Netherlands, on Saturday, blocking an access to the ancient parliamentary complex.
A group of protestors joined the truckers, holding a banner that read “Love & Freedom, No Dictatorship” in Dutch.
The demonstrators were persuaded to move to a park where the municipality stated they may demonstrate, and the public was warned about traffic congestion in the city.
SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES
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