French farmers began migrating toward Paris on Monday, threatening to block major highways and blockade the capital as they demand better working conditions.
Nationwide protests have erupted in the European Union’s largest agricultural producer for days, with farmers angry about inadequate incomes, red tape and environmental policies they say undermine their ability to compete with less stringent neighbors.
Across France, farmers used tractors and trucks to block roads and choke traffic.
They plan to set up eight chokepoints on main arterial roads into Paris on Monday afternoon in an effort to intensify their pressure campaign.
In response, the government ordered the deployment of 15,000 police and paramilitary gendarmes.
Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin asked troops to exercise restraint but also warned farmers not to interfere with strategic locations.
“We are not going to allow government buildings, tax buildings or grocery stores to be vandalized, or trucks transporting foreign products to be stopped. Obviously, this is unacceptable,” he said.
Darmanin said the protests would not affect operations at Paris’s Charles de Gaulle and Orly airports, or at the international wholesale food market in Longis, south of Paris, where armored police vehicles were deployed on Monday.
Police and gendarmes were also ordered to prevent any invasion of Paris itself, Darmanin said.
The government has been trying to prevent farmers’ discontent from spreading ahead of June’s European Parliament elections, seen as a key test for President Emmanuel Macron’s government.
Prime Minister Gabriel Attal was again eager to address farmers’ concerns when he visited farms on Sunday after a series of concessions announced on Friday failed to defuse the crisis.
“I hope we clarify things and see what additional steps we can take” to address farmers’ complaints that they face unfair competition, he said.
“Putting pressure on the government”
Arnaud Rousseau, the leader of FNSEA, one of the main farmers’ unions, said he expected to meet Attal later on Monday.
“Our goal is not to annoy the French people or make their lives difficult, but to put pressure on the government,” he told broadcaster RTL.
Some roadblocks were lifted over the weekend, but farmers driving tractors returned early Monday and gathered at staging areas to begin their march toward the capital.
Two activists threw soup at the glass where the Mona Lisa is protected at the Louvre museum on Sunday to draw attention to agriculture.
“Which is more important? Art or the right to healthy and sustainable food,” the campaigner asked.
“Your agricultural system is sick. Our farmers are dying on the job,” they said.
The FNSEA and Jeunes Agricultueurs (Young Farmers) plan to begin the siege of Paris at around 2:00 pm (1300 GMT) on Monday.
Taxi drivers staged a protest on Monday over insufficient pay for French health services transporting patients, adding to chaos on France’s roads.
Their slow-moving protests began blocking highways across the country, including the A13 motorway into Paris.
Belgian farmers mobilize
In neighboring Belgium, farmers stepped up their action, blocking a major highway on Sunday as they also demanded better conditions.
Dozens of tractors drove slowly over an overpass, disrupting traffic on the E42 motorway north of Namur in the south of the country.
Farmers protested outside a Belgian football stadium, causing a 30-minute delay in the match between Sporting Genk and Sint-Truiden.
The dissatisfaction of the Belgian peasantry was similar to that of the French peasantry.
Similar farmer protests have sprung up in recent weeks in Germany, Poland, Romania and the Netherlands.
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
