Strasbourg Journal: Mayhem

– By Scott Sayare –
STRASBOURG, France — Anarchists rise before dawn.
They wore black, the skinny, pale 20-somethings, tattooed and pierced, in masks or balaclavas – the “Black Bloc,” they were called. They were German, French, British, Turkish, all rallied around the anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist, anti-government cause. They carried red flags marked with the hammer and sickle, [...]

Paris Journal: What a day for a daydream, reprise

– By Scott Sayare –
PARIS — For six weeks, French mailmen, teachers, train conductors, factory workers and government employees have been rallying the troops, readying banners and stoking the flames of popular discontent here before taking to the streets today in a massive protest.
But on this warm and sunny Thursday morning, you might not have [...]

Paris Journal: Students in the streets

– By Scott Sayare –
PARIS – The green trucks and cleaning crews were there well before it was over, waiting in the streets behind the crowd. At 6:15, just before dark, thousands of marchers were asking, “Is it finished?” between cigarette drags. By 6:30, a line of 50 riot police and plainclothes officers in orange arm bands had [...]

Corduroy in the streets: The professors’ protest

– By Scott Sayare –
PARIS — Roused by mounting popular foment and bristling at the government’s proposed education reforms, tens of thousands of French university professors and students, including as many as 50,000 in Paris, took to the streets across the country on Tuesday. Of France’s 83 public universities, only 15 were untouched by the [...]

In France, a free press? Not when it comes to racism.

– By Scott Sayare –
PARIS — Last week, Paris’s court of appeals sentenced Jean-Marie Le Pen, founder and president of the Front National, the radical right-wing French political party, to three months prison time, with parole, and a 10,000 euro fine. Le Pen had appealed the sentence, first handed down last February, for remarks made [...]