The emblematic restaurant of 6e district was the victim of a fire start during the demonstration against the pension reform, this Thursday.
By VD with AFP
© Thomas SAMSON / AFP
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DClashes erupted Thursday in Paris between several hundred radical demonstrators and the police with the start of a fire at the Rotonde and a vandalized bank, during the 11e day of mobilization against the pension reform. Leaving the Esplanade des Invalides towards Place d’Italie, the procession passed in front of the famous restaurant where Emmanuel Macron had celebrated in 2017 his qualification for the second round of the presidential election.
It was then that “a group in black”, placed at the front of the demonstration, “sent projectiles”, including “bottles, cobblestones and firecrackers” at the police, who placed themselves in protection of the brewery, according to an AFP journalist. The police headquarters estimated the number of members of this group at several hundred. A fire broke out after a smoke bomb was thrown at the red awning. A woman inside the restaurant first tried to put out the fire with a fire extinguisher. The intervention of the firefighters then made it possible to quickly contain the flames.
A bank also targeted
A little further, on Boulevard Raspail, a group of radical demonstrators attacked a bank branch after removing the protective plates. These demonstrators then broke the windows then “emptied the bank of files and computer keyboards under the applause”, forcing the police, targets of new projectiles, to use tear gas to disperse them, noted the AFP.
READ ALSOMatzneff – The orgies of La RotondeThe police headquarters deplored “injuries among the police” but “the balance sheet is not consolidated at this stage”. A commissioner from a BRAV-M unit (motorized police) lost consciousness after receiving a cobblestone on the helmet, and was hospitalized, according to a police source.