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Macron condemns violence after protests

Police, protesters clash on the Seine riverside, a bridge

By Pol O Gradaigh, dpa
Published: January 5, 2019, 9:49pm

PARIS — French President Emmanuel Macron promised Saturday that justice “will be done” after the first yellow vest protests of the new year were again marked by violent clashes in Paris.

About 50,000 protesters took to the streets across France, Interior Minister Christophe Castaner said.

The turnout seemed something of a revival for the protests after declining numbers in the last weeks of 2019.

Few turned out during the holiday season. Macron had offered an expensive package of tax cuts and pay bonuses to appease protesters demanding improved living standards.

For Macron’s government, it was the scenes of violence that marked the day, as protesters clashed with police on the Seine riverside and on a pedestrian bridge.

The small Line News agency got more than 1.7 million Twitter views for footage showing a man — apparently a boxer — taking on riot police with his bare hands and, along with other protesters, forcing them back on the bridge.

A figure wearing the same clothing can be seen in another clip apparently kicking a policeman who had fallen to the ground.

A police trade union said on Twitter that the man had been identified, and described it as a “cowardly and intolerable attack.”

“Once again an extreme violence has attacked the Republic — its guardians, its representatives, its symbols,” Macron wrote on Twitter. “Justice will be done.”

Macron has promised a national debate on the wide range of issues raised by the movement, including taxation, the cost of living, democracy and public services.

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