Re: <nettime> About French demonstrations against the new labor

[marcelo@brumaria.net]

> It would be good to know more about what is happening if others on
nettime have been following these events.

this is some information in english and french, taken out of euromayday
mailing list - if anybody wants spanish info email me, i dont wanna flood
this list :) - hugs- marcelo + + +


http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=266437&area=/breaking_news/breaking_news__international_news/

French riot police storm historic Sorbonne

Paris, France
11 March 2006 08:41

French riot police stormed the marble-halled Sorbonne University early on
Saturday, pushing out about 200 students occupying the historic
institution, some for three days, to protest a government jobs plan.

At least 80 helmeted police officers rushed the landmark institution to
dislodge students, some holed up in a classroom barricaded behind desks,
chairs and debris.

The evacuation came hours after student occupiers hurled ladders, chairs
and other large objects from windows of the building on Friday night and
protesters outside egged them on.

Police acted on a demand from the rector of the Paris Academy, which runs
the university, moving in at 3.45am local time, police said.

Two people were injured in the ordeal, a student who fell and a
photographer hit by a projectile, a statement by Paris police headquarters
said.

LCI television reported that scores of students who fled the Sorbonne
broke windows of a fast-food restaurant. Twenty-seven were arrested, it
reported.

The disturbances were part of snowballing protests over a new jobs measure
that is posing a major test to the government. Up to 600 students were
reportedly in the Sorbonne on Friday, joining a sit-in that began on
Wednesday. The university was forced to close.

Numerous students told The Associated Press that the movement was not over.

The mass occupation at the Sorbonne, in the heart of the Latin Quarter,
the Left Bank student neighbourhood, was part of a larger movement by
students, along with the country's powerful unions, trying to force the
government to withdraw the jobs measure that will make it easier for
companies to fire workers younger than 26.

The government hopes the flexibility will spur employers to hire young
people, safe in the knowledge that they will be able to get rid of them if
necessary.

Critics say it will offer younger workers less job security than older
colleagues and undermine France's generous labour protections.

Police moved calmly in a block through the marbled and columned halls of
the Sorbonne, founded in the 13th century, entering from a back door. They
punched through the boarded-up classroom and blocked projectiles with
their shields.

The majority of students gathered in an inner courtyard under the famed
dome of the centuries-old university, lining up, choir-like, on the steps
of a chapel at one end. They were surrounded and moved out the main
entrance of the university without force but with sprays of tear gas.

"I was afraid before they came," said Alexandre Eliguler, one of the
occupying students who said they knew police would move in. But, he added:
"Their reaction was rather cool and they pushed us calmly to the exit." He
said students will not be dissuaded from their protest, which will
continue "starting tomorrow".

When police arrived, protesters decided to stick together "as a symbol",
said a third-year student in the building since Wednesday. Fearful of
compromising her studies, she identified herself only as Elodie.

"Everyone tried to be hyper-responsible of the place because we know it is
our national patrimony," she said.

She and other students said the situation degenerated when hundreds of
others joined the core group of about 80 occupiers on Friday. Police cited
damage to some classrooms.

The demonstration reached a pitch late on Friday with protesters hurling
ladders, chairs, a fire hydrant and other objects from a window toward
helmeted police outside. Police responded with tear gas.

A school administrator, Nicolas Boudot, said the protesters wanted to turn
the university into "a battlefield", not only against the jobs measure
"but against all of the social problems" France faces.

In Tours, 200km south-west of Paris, several hundred students moved on to
tracks at the railway station, stopping trains for three hours on Friday,
the SNCF rail operator said.

The main students' union said 45 colleges of France's 85 universities were
hit by strikes, though Education Minister Gilles de Robien dismissed those
figures as "lies". His ministry said eight universities were totally
strikebound and that 26 others were affected to various degrees.

Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin has made tackling sky-high youth
unemployment a top priority. However, the furor over the job contract has
further eroded confidence in the government -- and may dent De Villepin's
ambitions for next year's presidential elections.

"It's about our future, and we are determined not to give up," said Elisa
Penisson, a 21-year-old undergraduate majoring in French literature at the
Sorbonne.

Students have said they will continue occupying university buildings until
the government withdraws the measure -- pushed through the Lower House of
Parliament without debate, causing a fury. It passed its final hurdle on
Thursday and could take effect in April.

Sorbonne philosophy professor Bruno Haas said he'd given classes to a
"small core of dedicated students" at cafés since Wednesday's closure of
the site. "They're just hurting themselves by occupying the university.
They need to study before they get jobs, anyway." -- Sapa-AP

_______________________________________________


La Sorbonne évacuée par les CRS, 11 interpellations
pix
samedi 11 mars 2006 (Reuters - 09:01)
pix

PARIS - L'université de la Sorbonne, au coeur de Paris, a été évacuée
samedi matin par les forces de l'ordre après une douzaine d'heures
d'occupation par 200 manifestants hostiles au contrat première embauche
(CPE).

Les CRS, qui sont intervenus vers 3h45 sur réquisition du recteur de
l'académie de Paris, chancelier des universités, ont interpellé onze
personnes au cours de l'évacuation, a précisé à Reuters un porte-parole de
la préfecture de police de Paris.

Deux personnes ont été blessées sans gravité, un photographe atteint par
un projectile et un manifestant qui a fait une chute, a-t-il ajouté.

Les occupants ont tenté de se barricader à l'intérieur du bâtiment en
empilant des portes, des tables, des chaises, et les forces de l'ordre ont
été reçues par "de nombreux projectiles".

En prenant en compte les heurts survenus vendredi après-midi devant
l'université, 31 policiers ont été légèrement blessés au total à la
Sorbonne, dont onze lors de l'évacuation, selon la préfecture, qui a aussi
signalé "de nombreuses dégradations".

Le président de l'université de la Sorbonne, Jean-Robert Pitte, a espéré
que les étudiants pourraient "travailler dans des conditions normales
lundi".

"Je regrette qu'on ait été obligé d'en venir là", a-t-il dit sur France
Info, parlant de "jeunes irresponsables".

"Un certain nombre de trublions, que je ne qualifierais pas d'étudiants
même s'il y en a quelques-uns parmi eux, se sont cru obligés de faire
comme leurs parents ou leurs grands-parents et d'occuper la Sorbonne parce
que c'est un lieu symbolique".

"Les cours n'ont jamais cessé dans notre université puisque treize sites
sur quatorze sont restés ouverts jusqu'à hier soir et que les cours ont eu
lieu", a-t-il souligné. "Tout s'est passé normalement jusqu'ici sauf sur
le site de la Sorbonne, qui est symbolique" de mai 1968.

"UN PETIT GROUPE DE GENS DÉCIDÉS"

Jean-Robert Pitte a aussi estimé qu'il fallait relativiser le nombre
d'étudiants en grève contre le CPE. "Ce mouvement concerne combien de
personnes ? Je considère que c'est au maximum 0,5% des étudiants de
Paris-Sorbonne qui sont concernés par ce mouvement, les autres ont envie
de travailler c'est tout."

"Avec un petit groupe de gens décidés et bien formés dans certains
mouvements, on peut arriver à faire beaucoup de bruit et à faire
illusion que c'est la jeunesse française qui se révolte", a-t-il estimé.

Jean-Robert Pitte a par ailleurs jugé "totalement déplacée" l'initiative
du président de l'université de Nantes, François Resche, qui a écrit au
Premier ministre Dominique de Villepin pour lui demander le retrait du
CPE.

"Un président d'université, qui est un établissement public, doit
appliquer la loi et il y a même des règles en la matière", a-t-il ajouté.

La Sorbonne était occupée depuis mercredi par 60 à 80 personnes hostiles
au CPE.

Vendredi en fin d'après-midi, elle a été "prise d'assaut" par près de 300
personnes qui, pour une grande part, n'étaient pas des étudiants, selon le
rectorat de Paris, qui a évoqué des "radicaux" désireux de faire de la
Sorbonne une tribune pour parler des problèmes des
sans-papiers ou des intermittents du spectacle.

Selon le ministère de l'Education nationale, huit universités étaient
bloquées par la grève contre le CPE et 26 autres "perturbées à des degrés
divers" vendredi après-midi, sur les 84 que compte le pays.

Jeudi, le ministère avait recensé onze universités en grève et 20 qui
connaissaient "des perturbations partielles affectant un nombre limité de
sites ou de facultés".

L'Unef, principal syndicat étudiant, affirmait pour sa part que 45
universités étaient totalement en grève vendredi.


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