French high school students protest education conditions, clash with police

French high school students have lit fires and hurled projectiles at police, who responded by firing tear gas, in an escalating protest movement demanding better conditions in education.

The government says that the students in their mid-to-late teens studying in lycées (high schools) have every right to air grievances but has condemned violence, which has included a policeman being chased, kicked and beaten by a group of youths.

In La Ciotat in southern France, a teacher was sprayed with petrol before being physically assaulted by two people, officials said.

A young man wounded in Tours lost the use of his right eye, the city's prosecutor said on Friday.

He was injured on Wednesday as students clashed with police, the local prefecture said.

Students clash with police

On Friday, unions and student groups urged protesters to keep up pressure on the government and stage new rallies on Tuesday next week.

"High school students are expecting concrete measures from this government, and so far we have not received them," Ryad Rani, head of the USL high school union, said.

The movement, which began in the Paris region in September and spread nationwide, has seen teenage students at lycées in their final years of schooling block access to buildings and clash with police.

The students say their school hours are excessively long, conditions inadequate, including overheated classrooms, and that there are too many staff absences.

The protests have had political reverberations seven months before voters choose President Emmanuel Macron's successor.

Of the country's 3,700 schools, 735 were affected "in one way or another" on Friday, down 30 per cent from Thursday, Education Minister Édouard Geffray said after talks with activists.

He said that three staff members had been injured, compared with 31 on Thursday.

Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez said there had been 1,747 arrests on Friday, adding there had been "projectiles thrown, attacks on law enforcement, teachers, journalists, passers-by".

Mr Geffray said an action plan aimed at "speeding up the replacement" of absent teachers would be launched.

'Violent repression'

Students and police traded accusations of violence.

James, a high school student in the northern city of Lille, denounced what he called "extremely violent police repression, which inevitably fuels students' anger".

In the western city of Brest, police used tear gas at the Kerichen high school as students hurled projectiles at security forces, an AFP photographer said.

Mr Nuñez said images from the eastern city of Belfort showing a group of youths encircling a lone policeman and kicking him to the ground were of a "rare violence and intolerable".

In Paris on Friday, fire damaged the entrances of two high schools, with the fire brigade called to extinguish the blazes.

The police force has launched internal probes after accusations of brutality against demonstrators.

In the southern city of Toulouse, protesters administered eye drops to each other after police used tear gas.

In Aubervilliers, north of Paris, police used batons and riot shields to control protesters.

Mr Geffray told BFMTV at least 65 staff members had been injured, including 40 high school principals, since the start of the movement.

Some 170 students have been wounded while over 100 high schools have received "severe damage", he added.

"What matters now is ensuring our children are no longer out on the streets because they are in danger."