Giorgia Meloni’s administration has announced the deployment of 500 military troops to Milan after a weekend of intense protests and riots resulted in broken windows at luxury shops.
But while mainstream coverage has focused on exclusive brands hiding inventory from angry demonstrators, progressive organizations emphasize that the rage witnessed on the streets of several northern Italian cities is a result of the government’s own policies.
“A Louis Vuitton bag can cost €5,600, while the monthly maximum for the wage guarantee fund in 2026 is €1,340,” wrote the grassroots union Unione Sindacale di Base (USB). In a statement on Tuesday, the union cited devastating national statistics, including data showing that over 14% of working-class families live in absolute poverty.
Broken windows can be repaired, USB noted. “Five years of lost wages, an impoverished family, and a denied future cannot be recovered so easily.”
Students oppose austerity at school and beyond
Significant mobilizations preceded the weekend’s protests. On Friday, October 16, roughly 400,000 students flooded the streets for “No Meloni Day”. They criticized the government’s so-called securitization measures which in practice has meant stifling the right to protest, as well as the unabated turn toward war and armament.
Protesters warned that by prioritizing these points over public services and working conditions, Meloni and her ministers knowingly undermine the future of a whole generation.
Echoing developments in France, where teachers’ unions have supported students’ demands over recent weeks of historic struggle for a stronger public education system, educators in Italy began circulating appeals to do the same.
“The established order is the worst of all possible worlds – or comes very close to it – and our schools are a mirror of this: they are falling apart, alienating, militarized,” the appeal reads. “Places where the need to stretch one’s legs is labeled ‘indiscipline,’ and where the ‘foreigner’ is blamed for the decline in knowledge, rather than two decades of underfunding and neglect.”
Real solutions, not repression, needed to address social crisis
Trade unions, teachers, and students all denounced the repression authorities unleashed in response to the protests – both after mobilizations in cities and during school occupations.
“This government – incapable of offering solutions to the social crisis raging across the country – is once again attempting to manage the streets and social discontent solely through the lens of ‘public order,’ while intensifying repression and shrinking the space available for political activity,” emphasized youth organization Cambiare Rotta.
Students opposed the government’s focus on militarization. Source: Cambiare Rotta/Facebook
Teachers specifically called upon others in the system not to endorse crackdowns on students while invoking democratic values. “Democracy today resists in the French and Spanish squares, in the occupied Italian schools, in the resistance to the genocide of the Palestinian people, in the words and deeds of those who oppose the piecemeal world war,” they wrote.
“It is not to be found in threats, in tear gas, in police officers inside schools, or in students maimed by the weapons of our law enforcement. It is not to be found in the unjust rules that too many persist in defending.”
The increased protest activity has given hope that the spark that inspired massive mobilizations throughout 2025 might resurface. It comes less than two weeks before a new general strike – and an international dockworkers’ strike in which Italian port workers are set to play a notable role – on October 30.
Protests rarely remain confined to the grievances that first bring people into the streets. When the citizens believe their concerns are being ignored, a grievance over a particular policy or administrative decision can evolve into a broader challenge to the political authority. Consequently, what begins as a demand for correction becomes a question of accountability. […]
The European Union claims that "the fundamental right to freedom of expression" only applies to journalists "acting in good faith," and that authorities do not have to give due process before freezing people's bank accounts, as these sanctions are "temporary and are not criminal in nature," according to a legal letter shared by a sanctioned journalist.
Last year, the European Union blacklisted 21 people for allegedly spreading Russian propaganda, banning them from doing business in Europe. One of them, Hüseyin Doğru, was falsely listed as a Turkish citizen living in Istanbul. In fact, Doğru is a German journalist in Berlin, making him the first European citizen on European soil to be sanctioned this way.
It was like being sentenced to "civil death," Doğru told American journalist Chris Hedges. He was banned from holding a job in Europe or having a European bank account, and authorities have restricted Doğru to a €506 ($567) per month allowance from his own money. "The sanctions are designed for people outside of Europe, so they don't really know how that should function with me, because I'm a European citizen and I'm living in Europe," Doğru told Hedges.
Last month, the civil libertarian Wau Holland Foundation hired lawyers to contest the sanctions against Doğru. And earlier this month, the Council of the European Union sent a response letter, which Doğru shared on social media, promising to escalate the case to the E.U. General Court. Although the council conceded to Doğru that he is not a Turkish citizen living in Turkey, it still insisted on the authority to punish him for his speech.
The council quoted a 2022 court case between the Russian news outlet RT and several European countries: "The protection of the right of the media and, more particularly, of journalists to impart information on issues of general interest is subject to the proviso that they are acting in good faith and on an accurate factual basis and provide 'reliable and precise' information in accordance with the ethics of journalism."
Doğru's lawyers insisted that he should be treated as innocent until proven guilty. But the council responded that sanctions fall short of a criminal punishment, so any complaint about a "violation of the presumption of innocence is therefore unfounded." In other words, because he is not accused of a crime, Doğru has fewer rights than a criminal suspect.
"People need to understand sanctions are an extrajudicial measure. They're extrajudicial. There's no court. There is no hearing, no evidence, there is no sentence by the court, nothing," Doğru told Hedges. "When you're sanctioned, you are not informed….The day when I was sanctioned, me and my wife, my wife was pregnant back then, we went to the pharmacy to buy medicine for her, and her cards did not work."
The original blacklisting decision accuses Doğru of supporting "actions by the Government of the Russian Federation which undermine or threaten stability and security in the Union" by spreading "false information on politically controversial subjects with the intent of creating ethnic, political and religious discord amongst its predominantly German target audience."
Doğru and his wife, British journalist Lizzie Phelan, previously worked at the Russian-funded publication Redfish. A few months after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, he split off to create a new website called red.media, insisting to The Left Berlin that "we are not Russian. We are not Kremlin. red.media is not funded by Russia or any other state." In the same interview, Doğru called Russia an "imperialist" regime.
But in September 2024, a Biden administration "fact sheet" on Russian propaganda offhandedly mentioned red.media, citing a hit piece on Doğru by the German newspaper Tagesspiegel. Doğru told Hedges that the U.S. fact sheet created a circular logic in German media: "They said red.media is Russian because [U.S. Secretary of State Antony] Blinken said so. But what they never said is that Blinken is referring to your articles where you never say it like that. You say there is a suspicion, it might be so."
Doğru shut down red.media in May 2025 due to the bad press. The European Union sanctioned him a few weeks later. Doğru's lawyer, Alexander Górski, told the Frankfurter Allgemeine earlier this year that the European Union didn't "even attempt to make an evidentiary case" about any ongoing connection to Russia.
The blacklisting decision also claimed that, during a pro-Palestinian student protest at Humboldt University in Berlin, red.media "coordinated with the occupiers to disseminate images of their vandalism—which included the use of Hamas symbols." Doğru told Hedges that these accusations are an attack on journalists' freedom to do their jobs.
The European Union does not have the same protections for the freedom of the press as the U.S. Constitution. Earlier this year, the Curia of the European Union ruled that simply reposting clips from Russian media could be a violation of European sanctions, even if no money changes hands, something that is explicitly exempted from U.S. sanctions under the Berman Amendment.
Still, U.S. authorities have tried to push the limits of international sanctions to censor speech. The Biden administration told an American nonprofit that "the provision of a platform for [the sanctioned individuals] to speak" was illegal, backing down after the nonprofit sued.
And the Trump administration sanctioned Italian academic Francesca Albanese for her "lawfare" calling for the prosecution of Israeli leaders and a boycott of Israeli industries. In addition to freezing her bank accounts, the sanctions forced Columbia University researchers to cut off their relationship with Albanese, and Georgetown University to close her email account.
In the same statement accusing red.stream of being a Russian front, the Biden administration announced sanctions on two Russian news agencies. "We encourage dissent, open debate, and free discourse. But we will not stand for attempts by state actors to carry out covert activities with the goal of hijacking that discourse," the statement insisted. "The ultimate goal of sanctions is not to punish, but to bring about a positive change in behavior."
This week, editors Peter Suderman, Katherine Mangu-Ward, Nick Gillespie, and Matt Welch discuss the riots engulfing France and whether the country's increasingly unsustainable welfare state has made it ungovernable. They examine competing claims that immigration and austerity are fueling the unrest, the political gains being made by the French right, and why even modest pension reforms provoke fierce resistance.
The conversation turns to the United States, where President Donald Trump's tariffs are losing support among blue-collar voters and Republicans are struggling in traditionally conservative areas like Ohio. The panelists then discuss the abrupt departure of White House press secretary Katie Zacharia after just five days on the job. Later, they examine Sen. Elizabeth Warren's (D–Mass.) opposition to a proposed $45 billion merger involving McCormick and Unilever. Finally, a listener asks why libertarians don't follow the Democratic Socialists of America's example by trying to reshape the Republican Party from within.
0:00—France's riots and the imploding welfare state
21:29—Trump's tariffs lose support among blue-collar voters.
29:41—Zacharia's tenure as White House press secretary
35:45—Listener question on libertarian influence strategy
45:52—Warren's corporate merger opposition
57:07—Weekly cultural recommendations
Cato Innovation Project: Design your own full-time, paid role at Cato. If we fund your idea, you spend two years executing it. Apply here: cato.org/reason
Katherine Mangu-Ward appears on the left. Nick Gillespie appears on the right. An image of a car that's been set on fire by protesters appears in the center. Bold text across the top of the screen reads "FRANCE RIOTS."
Mass mobilizations against austerity policies and their effects are not winding down in France. On Saturday, October 17, roughly 800,000 people joined protests across more than 1,700 assembly points, according to union figures – amplifying demands tabled over a month of student protests and demanding urgent action on the cost of living crisis.
In the aftermath of the protests, the government expanded local authorities’ powers to introduce curfews. This led to overnight movement limitation orders introduced in several cities, including central parts of Paris, Lille, Lyon, and Nice. Many of the curfews target young people in particular, reflecting institutional concern about the success of their recent mobilizations.
Over the past weeks, students launched a wave of school strikes and occupations, resisting the erosion of education services under successive neoliberal governments. Their movement drew support from trade unions and progressive political forces, who joined students on the streets to pressure the Lecornu administration to change course and prioritize public services and labor rights over armament.
Rallies and marches reinforced the student movement’s demands for accessible, equitable higher education, alongside trade unions’ calls for higher wages.
They also drew links to other historic moments of mobilization, including the struggle for Algeria’s liberation. Many groups taking part echoed the anniversary of the 1961 demonstration that ended in the massacre of hundreds of people protesting for independence.
Police violence continues
Teachers, families, and elected officials also joined, for a practical reason: to shield students from the law enforcement violence unleashed on their mobilization.
Saturday’s protests were again met with police violence, with officers relying – unsuccessfully – on tear gas and water cannons to disperse crowds. Serious injuries and cases of severe police brutality were reported throughout the day.
After repeated repression, and with neither the government nor President Emmanuel Macron offering credible solutions to protesters’ grievances, protests turned into riots. While those close to social movements emphasized the events were triggered by years of cuts and unimpeded attacks on workers’ rights, the middle and upper classes were indignant.
Recent protests in France have a decisively antifascist character. Protester’s sign reads: “Always angry, never fascist.” Source: Manon Aubry/Facebook
Macron channeled their reaction in his post-protest speech. He declared those responsible for the looting must be punished, while promising more “dialogue” and offering a mild acknowledgment of people’s concerns over fuel, food, and other essentials.
“There are people out there who rightfully feel that the price of fuel is too high,” the president said – before shifting responsibility elsewhere. He said rising prices were the result “of what is happening in the Persian Gulf – a war that France was not part of.”
The speech landed poorly at home and abroad. The Iranian government, for one, has repeatedly called out Macron for applying double standards between protests in West Asia and France, emphasizing that the French president had expressed support for US plans in Iran and that ongoing mobilizations were a logical outcome of the policies he endorsed.
Students reject Macron’s response
In France, protesters called out Macron for failing – yet again – to identify a concrete way out of the situation facing the country.
“Since the beginning of this movement, high school and university students have been met with nothing but contempt and police batons in response to their demands,” the university students’ union Union Étudiante wrote. “Yet we have put forward a clear set of demands, widely supported by everyone who took to the streets on October 17.”
“He did not utter a single word about the high school and university students maimed in the crackdown,” the organization added. “He said nothing at all about the real violence committed on Saturday,” referring to approximately 2,300 arrests made on that day alone – and dozens of young people who were seriously injured over the past weeks.
“It is not a matter of engaging in endless dialogue, but of responding concretely to the needs of high school and university students: income, housing, food services, healthcare, study conditions, access to degrees, and an end to repression.”
Lecornu attempts to blame left for chaos
Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu’s reaction to the protests drew an equally negative response from progressive forces, especially after he suggested left movements were responsible for chaos and violence.
“What a pathetic politician,” wrote presidential candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon. “He is responsible for the chaos – chaos he methodically prepared, whether through sheer incompetence or a deliberate ‘strategy of the worst’ aimed at conjuring up a ‘party of order’ that would make people forget his failure on the public finances.”
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has convened an emergency government meeting following two days of violent unrest in Milan and other northern cities, where demonstrators clashed with police, looted shops and damaged public property during protests over living costs and deteriorating public services.
Police brought 271 people to police headquarters following Sunday’s disturbances in Milan, including 220 minors. Of those detained, 32 were formally arrested and another 28 were reported to the judicial authorities, according to figures released on Monday, 19th October.
The violence has prompted the Italian government to consider further restrictions on those involved in violent demonstrations, potentially introducing additional powers directed at organised disorder and juvenile offenders.
Milan city centre hit by looting
The disturbances began during demonstrations on Saturday, 17th October, organised amid growing dissatisfaction over household expenses, public services and wider political grievances.
Although the protests initially included peaceful participants, groups of masked individuals subsequently confronted riot police in central Milan. Officers used tear gas and water cannon as demonstrators erected burning barricades and threw objects at security personnel.
The unrest continued on Sunday, when shops were attacked close to Piazza del Duomo, one of Milan’s principal commercial and tourist areas.
Among the premises targeted were branches of Decathlon, Arc’teryx and Vodafone. Television footage showed damaged shopfronts, overturned street furniture and burning rubbish containers.
According to police figures reported on Monday, 174 of those taken to police headquarters were subjected to preventive detention measures introduced under recent Italian security legislation.
Fourteen members of the security services were reported injured during Sunday’s disturbances, including ten police officers and four members of the municipal police.
The judicial authorities are examining the conduct of individuals suspected of taking part in attacks on businesses and confrontations with officers. Prosecutors have sought custodial measures against several adults accused of offences including devastation, looting and aggravated resistance.
The large proportion of minors among those detained has become a central issue in the political response.
Violence spreads across northern Italy
Milan was not the only city affected by disorder. Saturday’s demonstrations also produced confrontations in Turin, Bologna, Brescia and Bergamo.
Italian police reported arrests across the affected cities, while the scale and organisation of the disturbances have raised questions about whether different groups were acting independently or using demonstrations as opportunities for coordinated violence.
There is not yet sufficient publicly established evidence to attribute the disorder to a single organisation or political movement.
The clashes coincided with major protests in neighbouring France, where similar concerns over living costs and public administration have contributed to increasingly confrontational demonstrations.
Although the grievances overlap, the Italian and French movements have different political backgrounds and organisational structures.
Government considers emergency legislation
Following a meeting at Palazzo Chigi on Monday, Meloni’s government indicated that it was considering a legislative response, potentially through an emergency decree.
According to details of the government discussions, proposals under examination include additional measures against violent offences, changes to preventive policing and possible restrictions addressing road blockages.
Some measures could be drawn from security legislation already under consideration in the Italian Senate. Ministers have also discussed the need for more effective intervention against juvenile offenders.
The meeting included Deputy Prime Ministers Matteo Salvini and Antonio Tajani, Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi, Defence Minister Guido Crosetto and senior officials from the police, Carabinieri and intelligence services.
The government has stressed that peaceful demonstrations must remain protected while arguing that violence and organised destruction require a stronger response.
No final legislative text had been adopted at the conclusion of Monday’s meeting. A decree could be considered by the Council of Ministers as early as Tuesday, although the precise content remains subject to further examination.
Dispute over responsibility for policing
The unrest has also produced a dispute between Milan’s municipal authorities and the national government.
Mayor Giuseppe Sala questioned the adequacy of the policing arrangements, arguing that the number of officers initially deployed was insufficient to control the disturbances.
Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi rejected that criticism, while senior government figures accused local political leaders of failing to condemn the violence unequivocally.
The disagreement reflects a wider question over how responsibility for anticipating and containing serious public disorder should be divided between local administrations and national security authorities.
Italy’s opposition has also challenged the government’s handling of the disturbances. Former Prime Minister Matteo Renzi criticised Meloni and Piantedosi over their failure to prevent the violence, calling for a change in leadership at the Interior Ministry.
The political argument is likely to intensify if the government proceeds with emergency legislation. Supporters of stronger police powers argue that the existing framework is insufficient to deal with rapidly organised disturbances, while opponents will scrutinise the proportionality of new restrictions and their effect on peaceful protest.
The immediate test for the government will be whether additional legal powers can improve public-order operations without replacing effective policing, intelligence gathering and judicial enforcement.
The curfew will be in effect from 11 p.m. Monday until 6 a.m. Tuesday. In addition, gatherings and demonstrations are banned from 8 p.m., the Paris police said.
The curfew will be in effect from 11 p.m. Monday until 6 a.m. Tuesday. In addition, gatherings and demonstrations are banned from 8 p.m., the Paris police said.
Is this really about cost of living? Over the weekend, the civil unrest that had been at a simmer boiled over in cities all over France. Over 1,000 police officers were injured, with seven seriously injured. More than 2,400 people were arrested.
"Rioters…attacked city halls from Lille in northern France to Marseille in the south, where they broke into the local government headquarters and tipped over a bust of Marianne, a symbol of the French Republic," reportsThe New York Times. "A fire destroyed a tourist office in Lyon, and 1,500 shops were damaged or looted nationwide, according to Alexandre Bompard, head of the French federation of commerce and distribution, who estimated that the cost of repairs could run into hundreds of millions of dollars."
"They came prepared," claimed the French journalist Paul Amar on CNews. "They had the addresses of town halls. They had addresses of Jewish shop owners. In a street in Marseille, all businesses owned by Jews were set on fire. Businesses run by Muslims weren't." The Jewish Community Protection Service has disputed such claims.
Reason's Matt Welch has a good write-up of how the violence and destruction have altered Lyon, Paris, Marseille, and Limoges, where the city hall was burned and collapsed.
Ces images doivent faire le tour du monde. Nos voisins doivent savoir.
Lyon l'une des plus grandes villes de France le 17 octobre est l'une des villes les plus touchées.
A Lyon, aucun commerce n'a été épargné, oui aucun commerce n'a aucun épargné vous avez bien lu. Toutes les… pic.twitter.com/15dG6QB5lK
What was nominally about cost of living and budget issues appears to have expanded far beyond those. ("Free Palestine" and "ACAB" graffiti have been seen everywhere.) President Emmanuel Macron has blamed far-left protesters, saying they have taken advantage of the situation. Far-right leader Marine Le Pen has blamed the "Macronist administration that is out of steam, exhausted, and disoriented."
It's not clear to me how the possibility of that retirement age needs to be raised will in any way be changed by, say, donning black balaclavas and breaking into the Louis Vuitton store:
French rioters loot Louis Vuitton store located just 2 KM away from the Élysée. pic.twitter.com/cnb5aWczcN
Here's how it all started: Since September 18, lycée (or secondary-school) students have held demonstrations, starting in the Paris suburb, Créteil. The students said the Education Ministry had neglected them—not enough resources, not enough teachers, and overcrowded classes. (The original demands were met and that strike ended, but not before sparking a wider movement.) This was all happening concurrently as the government was deciding its budget, and public-sector strikes were beginning. High social-program spending, an aging population, and high debt-to-GDP, plus an ever-increasing cost-of-living is resulting in a math problem that politicians have no real way out of except by raising the retirement age. Over the last few years, the French have had several hissy fits over the possibility of that happening.
Lawmakers from left-wing party La France Insoumise were at the first blockade on September 21, which has sparked questions about whether the party helped fuel the protests ahead of April's presidential election. I take all this—the disparate movements, the sheer volume of violence, the political-party involvement, the elections coming up—to mean that what started as an education-quality/cost-of-living protest has been used to lodge all kinds of grievances, and is attracting allies with an unquenchable thirst for violence and destruction.
Scenes from New York: "Darrel Rodriguez, 26, was shot on Saturday in the 7th Avenue Station on 53rd Street, a few blocks from Times Square, the police said. An unidentified man approached Mr. Rodriguez on the northbound E train platform, drew a gun and shot him once in the chest, they said," reportsThe New York Times. The man who shot Rodriguez was wearing a full balaclava-style face covering, and has not been found by the cops.
Philadelphia enacted a ban on such masks back in 2023. Just anecdotally, I've seen a lot of them in New York, but not by people trying to stay warm in the cold—these types of masks are used by people hopping turnstiles, stealing from bodegas, and more. Some bodega owners have started posting signs on their doors saying masks aren't allowed, since it's become such a problem.
"As of Oct. 11, there have been 1,697 crimes in the transit system since the start of the year, 27 more than the same period in 2025," reportsThe New York Times, citing Police Department figures.
In Texas, Ken Paxton appears to have lost the support of suburban women, according to The Washington Post.
"Jewish life in the Emirates has grown quieter and less visible," notesThe New York Times. "Religious symbols have disappeared, and gatherings have moved into private. Many have become more guarded about their online presence and their willingness to speak to the media. Some are reconsidering how openly to identify themselves as Israeli or Jewish, while others weigh whether they can still build a life in a nation they once considered a haven."
Can you really see everything?
YOU CAN SEE EVERYTHING is doing a public service if it gets the general population to question why, precisely, folks lend so much credence to documentaries as vehicles of truth. https://t.co/n7CHwkmDmrpic.twitter.com/IHUvEbKECl
"I recently attended a meeting of the Democratic Socialists of America, where I officially enrolled as a member. Though I was new to the party, I put forth a number of proposals, many of which were met with considerable enthusiasm and, I'm happy to report, have now been incorporated into their manifesto," writes Larry David in a satirical essay for Airmail. "We contend that the only way anyone can be rehabilitated is through the simple act of love. When the D.S.A. takes over, it will be our policy to close the jails and release all prisoners. Once released, the former prisoners will continue to walk around in their orange jumpsuits, the easier to spot them. People will be encouraged to give them a pat on the back, offer some words of encouragement, and maybe even get them to open up about their crimes. Imagine how upsetting it must be to know you've taken a life! To err is human, to forgive, divine. With empathy and compassion, it's easy to see a day when these former convicts will be contributing to society in a very meaningful way." It's not that funny of an essay, but I think it's great for more people to be talking about how asinine DSA ideas are.
In May, William Tharien, a 19-year-old student, made his second attempt at passing NEET, India’s national entrance exam for would-be medical students. Passing the test was the only way William would be eligible to study to be a doctor, surgeon, dentist or vet and he was competing with about 2.2 million other students for one of about 130,000 places in medical schools around the country. What makes the test even more nerve-wracking is that only half of these places are available at heavily subsidized state-run colleges, rather than expensive private institutions.
It can take students up to two years to prepare for these exams, with parents going into debt to pay fees at tuition centers entirely devoted to cracking the test. Days after William, and millions of others, took the test on May 3, authorities discovered that the paper had likely been leaked and circulated on social media platforms like Telegram. The results were voided.
Around the same time, the Chief Justice of India’s Supreme Court compared young people “who don’t get any employment and don’t have any place in a profession” to cockroaches and parasites. In a country with the largest population of 15- to 29-year-olds in the world (nearly 370 million people) and high levels of youth unemployment, particularly amongst the educated, the judge’s remarks struck a raw nerve.
It led to the formation of the Cockroach Janta Party — a mocking reference to India’s governing Bharatiya Janata Party, led by prime minister Narendra Modi — initially as a satirical meme. But the cancellation of NEET gave the Cockroach Janta Party real-life relevance and made it an outlet to channel the extensive frustration and anger of India’s youth.
In neighboring Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, so-called Gen Z protests between 2022 and 2025 had toppled governments.
In June, William joined tens of thousands of students in Jantar Mantar, an iconic venue for public protest in the Indian capital Delhi, to call for the resignation of Minister of Education Dharmendra Pradhan over the NEET debacle. The demonstrations lasted for weeks, even as the Delhi Police resorted to tear gas, pellet guns, electric shock devices, and lathis (nearly six-foot-long bamboo sticks) to disperse the crowds. William was a regular.
“I always felt watched,” he told us. At metro stations, on his way to the protests, he said he repeatedly encountered the police. “They made sure that we saw them and that we should feel intimidated by their presence and their numbers.”
As journalists, we covered the June-July protests, including on July 20 when the police brutality reached an ugly peak as protesters marched towards the Indian parliament. Artificial intelligence-enabled CCTV cameras installed under Delhi’s “Safe City” project lined the streets in and around Jantar Mantar. A permanent surveillance tower stood at the center of the protest site, recording around the clock. Multiple drones circled overhead. Photographers hired by the police moved through the crowd. Some officers carried body cameras, and at least one police officer was seen wearing Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses.
Two police surveillance vehicles were parked just outside the entrance to Jantar Mantar. One was Ikshana (the Sanskrit for, literally, the act of seeing), an AI-powered police van with eight cameras that used facial recognition technology to match faces to police databases in real time. The other was a mobile command center.
According to William, the surveillance was not limited to the protest site. “I saw police detaining students at the metro station,” he said. “They were recognizing students from footage, identifying them by their bags, or style of mask or sunglasses.”
Even after the protests stopped, with the July 25 resignation of Pradhan, the education minister, William said the police paid visits to students in their neighborhoods. They were tracking down protesters. On August 3, he said, two police officers showed up at his lodgings. He was alone. “We have photos of you,” the police told him, “in colour. You’ve been seen going to the protest site on multiple days and also seen at the metro station.” Insisting that attending protests was a democratic right, William refused to let the police into his room without a warrant.
According to the Indian Express, the Delhi Police used surveillance footage accrued during the NEET protests in the summer to identify at least “2,800 people with a criminal background” who would be be prevented from protesting against Gyanesh Kumar.
Aishe Ghosh, a prominent student activist and national office holder at the left-wing Students’ Federation of India, has challenged the Indian government and the Delhi Police in court over the indiscriminate use of surveillance technology. Not only were the authorities documenting the protests, she alleges, they were using the footage to threaten protesters with public exposure.
Long an object of surveillance, Ghosh, who was a leader of the NEET protests, said the police entered the Communist Party of India (Marxist) headquarters in Delhi to arrest her in August on the basis of protests she had attended five years earlier in 2021. Describing the attempt to arrest Ghosh as a “continuing witch hunt against student protesters,” the CPI(M) added that it was evidence of “the Modi government’s escalating assault on democratic rights.”
Ishan Tankha
Modi’s surveillance state
Hearing Ghosh’s litigation, the Delhi High Court appeared to suggest that the urgency to examine her specific allegations had dissipated since the NEET protests had concluded. The judges suggested that she file a more general petition.
The NEET protests proved only to be the start of the Cockroach Janta Party’s precipitous rise as serious, youth-led opposition to the Modi government, in power since 2014 and seemingly determined to use every arrow in its quiver, from opaque sources of funds to the takeover of independent institutions to the use of surveillance technology, to stifle dissent. In October, the “cockroaches” poured into Delhi’s streets again.
This time, they wanted the resignation of Gyanesh Kumar, India’s Chief Election Commissioner, a constitutional role meant to be entirely independent, apolitical and focused on maintaining the integrity of the Indian electoral process. An investigation by the Indian Express newspaper revealed that despite 14 objections in the last 10 months from the two other members of the election commission, Kumar had allegedly illegally taken unilateral decisions that resulted in voters being left off electoral rolls. India is currently undertaking an extensive revision of its voter lists that has controversially already disenfranchised 130 million people and potentially swayed state elections in favour of the governing BJP.
Kumar has not directly addressed the Indian Express’s findings. And while Modi too has remained typically silent — in his 12 years as prime minister, he has yet to call a single press conference — the Delhi Police has once again used violence and arbitrary arrests to crack down on still ongoing protests. Jantar Mantar, the de facto site of protests in Delhi since 1993, has been officially shut down. Prominent protesters, including Aishe Ghosh and the founders of the Cockroach Janta Party, have been detained. The opposition led by Congress Party scion Rahul Gandhi — the son, grandson and great-grandson of former Indian prime ministers — has been galvanized.
But India’s next general election is not until 2029 and the next major state legislative election is not until February 2027 at the earliest. Maintaining momentum is a task Gandhi has yet to show he can manage.
Meanwhile, the BJP continues to use friendly mainstream television media, alongside its heavy-handed policing, to argue that the protests are marginal, paid for by foreign sources and disliked by the large majority of Indians.
Fallible facial recognition tech
Technology researcher Srinivas Kodali told Coda that India’s efforts to modernise its policing system were stepped up after terrorist attacks in Mumbai in November 2008. Police stations across the country were connected, with access to criminal records and a tracking database. If someone attends a protest somewhere in India, Kodali explained, and has a police report filed against them, that information will be available to every police department in the country. He described the approach as “360-degree profiling,” pulling data together from facial recognition technology, surveillance towers, phone records, social media activity, and government databases including electoral records.
Delhi Police has said its use of technology and AI is meant to maintain law and order and identify people who already have a criminal record and not to randomly profile protesters. However, privacy researchers and lawyers warn that sophisticated surveillance systems can make participation in protests traceable long after the crowds have dispersed.
Much of the technology for this work is supplied by a growing group of private companies. Ikshana, the AI-powered police van used to monitor protesters in Jantar Mantar back in July, is one example. Rahul Bhardwaj, the Chief Growth Officer at analytics firm Intozi based in Gurugram, a tech hub on the outskirts of Delhi, said the company provides the software layer behind Ikshana’s system. Intozi processes video feeds through AI applications designed for tasks including crowd monitoring, detecting weapons and identifying people against police databases.
Intozi has previously deployed its facial-recognition technology for government security operations at high profile international summits in Delhi. Asked specifically whether its technology was used at Jantar Mantar this summer, though, Bhardwaj cited confidentiality obligations.
The company said that its role ends after its system is installed on police infrastructure, and that it does not retain the database or continue to access the system once it has been handed over to the police. “Images of people who are not in the police database,” Bhardwaj said, “are automatically blurred within seconds, while records associated with people already registered in police databases are retained by the police.”
That places responsibility for the technology and its subsequent use with the police.
Innefu Labs, whose AI Vision facial-recognition software has been used by Delhi Police in criminal investigations, declined to answer questions about data retention, legal safeguards or its operational relationship with police.
Another company, AjnaLens, confirmed its direct role in live policing. Kuldeep Pathak, Associate Director at AjnaLens said the company had supplied AI-enabled smart glasses to Delhi Police, first used in January 2026 in security operations during India’s Republic Day celebrations. The company confirmed that its glasses were used again during the NEET protests in Jantar Mantar. According to Pathak, their system was given access to a police database containing around 65,000 people with criminal records. He said 14 people were arrested after being recognized through the glasses.
Experts we spoke to questioned what authorises private vendors to access and process police databases, or whether an independent authority audits the system.
Ishan Tankha
Surveillance without accountability
“What statutory regime operates in this context?” asked Menaka Guruswamy, a senior lawyer who is involved in litigation in the Supreme Court over the use of facial recognition technology at Jantar Mantar. “Where is this information hosted? Is it hosted by the private vendor, the state or the police? We know nothing.”
Guruswamy said tenders and contracts between the state and private companies should make it possible to establish what data each party is permitted to access and retain.
Disha Verma, AI researcher at Tech Global Institute and Ashoka University, claims these private vendors get access to police datasets that help them train their AI systems. “They (vendors) did not need to buy training datasets from anywhere,” she says. “They didn’t need to test their product anywhere else. They ended up with a curated, very accurate facial-recognition system.” The data provided by the police, she added, would help vendors sell their product for profit to other companies that want to make use of surveillance technology.
“What I am most concerned about is how much impunity and data and power this gives the private vendors,” Verma said, calling it a “parallel police state.”
And then there’s the accuracy of the technology, little of which has been subject to question or scrutiny.
In response to Right to Information requests made by the digital rights group Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF) in 2022, the police said it considered facial-recognition results with an accuracy score of 80 percent or above as a positive match. Only results below the 80 percent threshold were “subject to further verification using corroborative evidence.”
But the distinction between technical facial recognition matches and actual verified identifications became harder to ignore after the NEET protests in Jantar Mantar in the summer. Delhi Police said its facial recognition system identified 2,873 people with previous criminal records at the protest between July 20 and 26. But at least 25 of those people were actually in jail at the time they were supposed to be protesting.
Intozi’s own description shows why that distinction is not always straightforward. Bhardwaj told us that the company’s recognition threshold is “generally kept above 70 to 80%” and once that threshold is crossed, “it is a 100 percent match for us.” This is why, argues Guruswamy, the Supreme Court lawyer, a statutory framework is necessary. “There is no foolproof system,” she said. “That is why you need accountability, a legal regime, data protection and safeguards governing how these interactions take place.”
Nearly six years ago, Ahmed* (name changed on request) experienced the pitfalls of the Delhi Police’s then fledgling facial recognition technology and surveillance system. He was identified by AI-assisted video analysis as being present during deadly communal violence in northeast Delhi in 2020. Ahmed spent around 18 months in jail, accused of killing a police official during the riots. He insisted that the man seen in the footage used as clinching evidence was someone else.
“My hair was cropped short, and I had different shoes. Only the white shirt and dark trousers matched. But that does not make anyone wearing those clothes me,” Ahmed told us. He said he had shut his shop around noon on the day of the violence and gone home. Footage from one security camera showed him near the lane where he lived. But police later said it had used Amped FIVE, a video and image analysis tool, and AI Vision, facial recognition software made by Indian company Innefu Labs, to place Ahmed at the scene of the crime.
In September 2021, Ahmed was released on bail. The court noted that several people in the area wore similar clothes to those shown in the footage and that the video analysis identifying Ahmed across different recordings would have to be tested at trial.
By then, though, the damage to Ahmed’s life had already been done. Before his arrest, Ahmed ran a garments shop and employed a couple of workers. The shop did not survive his incarceration and, while on bail, he now works at a street stall, barely surviving on his meagre income.
Facial recognition systems turn facial features into numerical data and compare them with stored images, producing a similarity score or a list of possible matches. In a one-to-many search, a single face from a protest can be compared against an entire database.
“It's able to recognize a face the way an iPhone camera might,” Disha Verma, the Ashoka University researcher said. An iPhone's front camera works because everyone looks at it from roughly the same angle in consistent light, she added; but a police station is often dimly lit, angles vary, and the camera used to take the photo might be old and pixelated. "The system the police are using usually has a very large error rate, just inherently," Verma said.
Katie Kinsey, Chief of Staff and Tech Policy Counsel at the New York University School of Law’s Policing Project, told us that broad accuracy claims tell little about how a facial recognition system might work once it leaves controlled testing conditions. “A model tested on one dataset may behave differently when the cameras, lighting, image quality and population change,” she said.
Live video presents an additional difficulty because the images are less controlled and officers may be acting on alerts as events unfold. Kinsey said systems should be tested under the actual conditions in which police intend to use them.
Verma also raised concerns about biases affecting facial recognition systems. “If the police think a criminal looks like a dark-skinned bearded young man,” Verma said, “that is the data they will collect and that is what will train the AI.” It would, she added, create a feedback loop in which technology does not remove police prejudice but reproduce and legitimise it instead.
India has constitutional privacy protections and general data protection legislation, but no dedicated law for the use of facial recognition technology. Basically, “you won’t know you are on a watch list,” researcher Srinivas Kodali told us.
We reached out to the Delhi Police Cyber Cell with questions about the use of live facial recognition technology and other surveillance systems during protests, but did not receive a response.
Some jurisdictions have tried to place clearer limits on this type of power. For example, under the European Union’s AI Act, real-time remote biometric identification by law enforcement in public spaces is generally prohibited, with narrow exceptions. Even then, its exceptional use is subject to necessity and proportionality requirements and generally requires prior judicial or independent authorization.
Police in India have long maintained categories of people they consider suspects or potential troublemakers. For instance, in the south Indian state of Telangana, police have a category called “rowdy sheets” for people considered habitual offenders or threats to public order. With facial recognition technology, these categories have only widened.
Lawyer Menaka Guruswamy wondered what might happen when someone photographed at one protest is then seen at another protest. “Are we being criminalized simply for attending protests?”
Verma said that one of the significant shifts that she has witnessed over the years is how the technologies once associated with borders and the military have moved to civilian policing. The militarization of the Delhi Police has been evident as paramilitary personnel dressed in camouflage have been assaulting and detaining protesters.
Still, the protesters come.
William Tharien told us that despite being a known face to the Delhi police, despite his fears and struggles with his mental health, despite the monitoring of his social media, he is not going to stop protesting.
And with Delhi’s cockroaches still calling for the resignation of India’s chief election commissioner, still warning of the danger posed to Indian democracy by the Modi government’s authoritarian tendencies, how, William said, could he give up the fight now?
What began as a student protest over deteriorating schools has developed into a nationwide revolt against economic hardship, political paralysis and declining public services. With the 2027 presidential election approaching, the violence has exposed problems that neither the government nor its principal opponents have convincing plans to resolve.
France’s latest wave of unrest has developed into one of the most serious domestic crises of Emmanuel Macron’s presidency. More than 550,000 people participated in demonstrations on 17 October, according to official estimates, before violence spread through Paris and other major cities. Shops were looted, police confronted rioters, and the historic town hall in Limoges was largely destroyed by fire.
The scale of the destruction prompted emergency government consultations and a televised presidential address. Macron promised to prosecute those responsible, while stopping short of declaring a state of emergency. Yet the immediate security challenge conceals a more difficult political question: why have protests that began with relatively specific demands over education become a confrontation involving such different sections of French society?
From school protests to a national revolt
The movement originated among secondary-school students demanding better facilities, more teachers and improvements in educational standards. Their complaints subsequently attracted trade unions, workers, farmers and elements of the Gilets Jaunes, the Yellow Vest movement that challenged Macron’s government in 2018.
The resulting coalition has no coherent political programme. Students protesting overcrowded classrooms share demonstrations with workers concerned about purchasing power and motorists angered by fuel prices. Their interests are not necessarily compatible, but they reflect a common dissatisfaction with the government’s ability to deliver functioning public services while containing living costs.
This distinction matters. The presence of masked rioters and organised groups engaged in violence does not establish that the hundreds of thousands who demonstrated peacefully supported their actions. Equally, the destruction of public buildings, attacks on police and widespread looting raise legitimate questions about the state’s capacity to maintain public order.
The economic problem behind the protests
At the centre of the discontent lies a structural problem that successive French governments have struggled to confront: the distribution of public expenditure between an ageing population and the services required by younger generations.
A French government budget assessment published in October revealed that pension obligations accounted for approximately 32 per cent of the education ministry’s budget, including €28.5 billion in pension expenditure. These obligations restrict the resources available for other departmental priorities.
France nevertheless remains a substantial spender on education. According to official figures, expenditure reached €199.2 billion in 2025, equivalent to 6.7 per cent of GDP. However, after inflation, the annual increase was only 0.1 per cent.
The issue is therefore not simply how much France spends, but how efficiently resources are allocated and whether expenditure meets changing educational needs.
The OECD’s 2025 PISA assessment found that French pupils’ performance in mathematics and reading had declined compared with 2022. Results were among the country’s lowest recorded, although broadly comparable with the OECD average.
These figures give the student protests a significance extending beyond the immediate condition of classrooms. They raise questions about France’s longer-term economic competitiveness and its capacity to provide younger generations with opportunities comparable to those enjoyed by their predecessors.
The limits of Macron’s reform programme
Macron entered office in 2017 promising to modernise the French economy and overcome the traditional division between left and right. Nearly a decade later, his administration faces a fragmented parliament, constrained public finances and growing resistance to further structural reforms.
The suspension of his pension reform illustrated the difficulty. Raising the retirement age was intended to reduce pressure on the pension system, but parliamentary opposition forced the government to defer the measure until after the presidential election.
The underlying financial pressures have not disappeared. Nor can they be resolved easily through additional spending when public debt, borrowing costs and budgetary obligations already restrict the government’s room for manoeuvre.
This creates an uncomfortable political reality: the state is expected to provide better services, greater purchasing-power protection and stronger security, while the available resources remain limited.
Can the opposition benefit?
The unrest comes approximately six months before the presidential election, with Marine Le Pen’s National Rally and Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s France Unbowed competing to establish themselves as alternatives to Macron’s political centre.
Le Pen has sought to combine support for economic grievances with demands for tougher policing. That position may attract voters concerned by the violence, but it also exposes tensions within a movement that previously supported the Yellow Vest protests.
Mélenchon faces a different difficulty. Supporting demonstrations against government policy is consistent with his political programme, but the involvement of violent groups risks shifting public attention from social demands towards questions of security.
A recent presidential opinion poll even suggested that Le Pen and Mélenchon could contest the final round, illustrating the weakening position of more conventional political alternatives.
Neither, however, can escape the fiscal constraints that have frustrated Macron’s government. A change of president would not automatically provide the resources required to expand public services, reform pensions and reduce the deficit simultaneously.
A wider problem for France and Europe
President Donald Trump has attributed the French unrest to immigration, although the movement’s documented origins lie principally in education, living costs and dissatisfaction with public services. Without established evidence about those responsible for individual acts of violence, broader claims about the demonstrators’ backgrounds remain speculative.
For the European Union, France’s instability carries consequences beyond its domestic political debate. France is central to European defence, fiscal negotiations and support for Ukraine. Sustained political paralysis would complicate its ability to negotiate and implement decisions requiring substantial public expenditure.
The immediate task for Macron’s government is to restore security without allowing the legitimate grievances of peaceful demonstrators to disappear from political consideration. The more difficult task will fall to whoever enters the Élysée in 2027.
France’s crisis is not simply a repetition of the Yellow Vest movement. It reflects a growing conflict over public resources, expectations of the state and the ability of established political institutions to reconcile competing demands.
The violence may subside, but the economic contradictions that brought such different groups onto the streets will remain. The presidential election will determine who inherits them, rather than whether they exist.
Macron echoed other government officials in blaming much of the violence on far-left activists, accusing them of attacking police and public buildings to foment chaos.
Macron echoed other government officials in blaming much of the violence on far-left activists, accusing them of attacking police and public buildings to foment chaos.
'Palestine poppies' are being sold by pro-Palestine campaigners ahead of Remembrance Sunday, sparking fury among veterans who say they're hijacking Britain's day of remembrance.
It’s a perfect storm of protesters with heartfelt grievances and others set on conflict. The key here is the sense of betrayal that united them on the streets
The first thing I learned on the streets of Paris this weekend is that there is no arguing with teargas. I arrived at Place de la République just after 1pm yesterday. The mood was festive until police started firing volleys of teargas into the square from Rue du Faubourg-du-Temple.
I didn’t see the inciting incident – if there even was one – and tried walking into the cloud of CS gas hanging in the air. It was impossible. The gas clings to your nose and burns your eyes, and you quickly start struggling to breathe. I retreated towards the Boulevard de Magenta, blinking furiously to stop the stinging.
Oliver Haynes is a journalist and co-host of Sacré Bleu: the French presidential election podcast
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Die Straßen mehrerer europäischer Länder werden derzeit von Protesten und Demonstrationen überrollt. Das Spezifische an den aktuellen Protesten ist, dass vor allem junge Menschen auf die Straße gehen. Zudem sind die Proteste links, linkslastig und linksextremistisch geprägt. Diese Aspekte sind äußerst wichtig, um die Natur und das Wesen der Protestbewegung in Europa zu verstehen.
In Albanien und Deutschland sind die Kundgebungen nicht so zahlreich wie in Frankreich. Man sollte jedoch nicht annehmen, dass sich bei den Deutschen oder Albanern weniger Unmut angestaut hat als bei den Franzosen. Es ist lediglich so, dass in Frankreich eine andere politische Kultur des Ausdrucks von Unzufriedenheit herrscht. Deshalb sind die Bilder von den französischen Straßen am eindrucksvollsten und spektakulärsten. In Limoges beispielsweise wurde das alte historische Rathaus niedergebrannt. In Deutschland ist so etwas unvorstellbar.
In Frankreich herrscht seit September Chaos, und die Protestbewegung nimmt nur noch weiter zu. Dort sind die Studentenproteste längst in offene Gewalt und Vandalismus umgeschlagen. Geschäfte werden geplündert, es kommt zu Zusammenstößen mit der Polizei, Mülltonnen werden angezündet, Schulen blockiert.
Am vergangenen Donnerstag gingen in Frankreich mehr als 70.000 Menschen auf die Straße. Insgesamt sind bereits rund 100.000 Menschen an den Protesten in Frankreich beteiligt; etwa 7.000 Personen wurden festgenommen, darunter fast 6.000 Minderjährige.
Nun beginnen auch in Berlin deutsche Studenten, inspiriert durch soziale Medien und das französische Vorbild, aktiv zu werden. Von Pogromen ist man in Deutschland natürlich weit entfernt. Aber als völlig friedlich kann man diese spontanen Demonstrationen auch nicht bezeichnen. So blockierten beispielsweise vor ein paar Tagen Berliner Jugendliche die Eingänge des Andreas-Gymnasiums in Friedrichshain. Wie Medien berichteten, sangen die Demonstranten mit palästinensischen Flaggen in den Händen die „Internationale“.
Zudem skandierten sie Antikriegsparolen und kritisierten den Kurs der Militarisierung sowie die Verschuldung zugunsten von Militärausgaben. Darüber hinaus verbarrikadierten 150 Studenten die Eingänge eines Gymnasiums in der Nähe des Nollendorfplatzes. Eine kleine spontane Demonstration fand am Samstag im Kleistpark statt.
Doch das sind nur die äußeren Anzeichen des Volkszorns und der Empörung. Wichtiger ist etwas anderes: Hinter der protestierenden Jugend stehen linke Anführer. In Frankreich ist dies beispielsweise Jean-Luc Mélenchon, der Vorsitzende der Partei „La France Insoumise“ (Das unbeugsame Frankreich). Die Proteste werden zudem von Gewerkschaften unterstützt. Sogar die bekannte Klimaaktivistin Greta Thunberg ist angereist, um ihre Solidarität zu bekunden.
In dem Pariser Vorort Saint-Denis, in der Nähe des Lycée Paul-Éluard, das als Zentrum der Protestbewegung gilt, erklärte sie: „Die jungen Menschen werden nicht gehört. Man stiehlt uns unsere Zukunft!“
Wie ernst und gefährlich sind diese Proteste also für die Regierung? Leider sind sie bisher nicht gefährlich.
Ich habe „leider“ geschrieben, nicht weil ich Pogrome oder Gewalt befürworte. Nein. Ich bin für Ordnung und die rechtmäßige Äußerung der eigenen Meinung.
Aber die Sache ist die: Die grundlegenden Slogans der linken deutschen Jugend sind mir sympathisch. Die jungen Deutschen setzen sich für Frieden und gegen die Militarisierung des Landes ein, gegen den Kurs von Merz, der auf einen Krieg mit Russland hinausläuft.
Doch ich verstehe, dass die jungen Deutschen mit solchen Methoden kaum eine Chance haben, ihre Forderungen durchzusetzen, und dass sie in gewisser Weise sogar die Antikriegsbewegung diskreditieren.
Ich erinnere mich, wie 1984 etwa 400.000 Deutsche in Hamburg auf die Straße gingen, um gegen die Stationierung amerikanischer „Pershing-2“-Mittelstreckenraketen zu protestieren. Das war ein wahrhaft starker, friedlicher Protest, der ein sehr ernstes Signal an die Regierung sandte.
Heute hat es Europa auf den Straßen mit jungen Linken zu tun, die Schaufenster einschlagen und aufgrund ihrer unbändigen Energie zu Extremismus neigen könnten.
Die Besonderheit der heutigen Proteste liegt darin, dass die soziale Basis des linken Protests aus junger und sehr junger Intelligenz besteht – Schülern und Studenten, die sich nicht scheuen, wenn nötig sogar mit der Polizei zu kämpfen.
Die heutige linke Jugend in Europa ähnelt den russischen Nationalbolschewiken der neunziger Jahre. Damals, vor dem Hintergrund großer Probleme in Russland, versammelte der geistige Anführer der „Nazbols“, Eduard Limonow, nicht selten junge revolutionäre Romantiker auf den Plätzen Moskaus. Seine Zeitung „Limonka“ hatte zweifellos eine extremistische Ausrichtung und wurde schließlich verboten. Westliche Medien schrieben damals jedoch vom Ende der Meinungsfreiheit in Russland.
Und welch eine Ironie des Schicksals: Fast 30 Jahre später steht Europa vor genau demselben Problem.
Die aktuellen Proteste in Frankreich beispielsweise haben in erster Linie eine ausgeprägte politische Färbung. Die Demonstranten fordern den sofortigen Rücktritt Macrons. Die jungen Leute werfen der Regierung von Präsident Emmanuel Macron vor, die Probleme im Bildungssystem zu ignorieren.
Doch das ist erst der Anfang. Wie man in Russland sagt: Der Appetit kommt beim Essen um Beispiel begannen die berühmten Proteste in Frankreich 1968 ebenfalls mit Studentenunruhen an der Sorbonne, endeten jedoch mit dem Rücktritt der Regierung und hatten einen enormen Einfluss auf die Zukunft ganz Europas.
Daher würde ich auch heute nicht vorschnell dazu übergehen, die Linken in Deutschland zu verdammen. Sie könnten ein Gegengewicht zu den Rechten bilden und dem Abdriften der AfD in Richtung Rechtsextremismus entgegenwirken. Ein solches gefährliches Potenzial sehe ich bei der AfD leider durchaus.
Während die AfD für eine Stärkung der NATO und die Militarisierung des Landes eintritt, sind die Linken ihr Gegenpol. Die Linken sind überzeugte Pazifisten. Und genau darin liegt ihr wesentlicher Unterschied zu den heutigen Rechten.
Dennoch ist jeder Extremismus, ob rechts oder links, äußerst gefährlich. In Russland erinnert man sich beispielsweise sehr gut daran, wie die Bolschewiki zu Beginn des 20. Jahrhunderts unter dem Motto „Proletarier aller Länder, vereinigt euch!“ eine Weltrevolution anzetteln wollten.
Was daraus wurde, weiß jeder. Ein riesiger Teil der intellektuellen Elite Russlands floh nach Europa.
Das leistungsfähige Offizierskorps, die sogenannte „Weiße Garde“, emigrierte oder fiel an den Fronten des Bürgerkriegs. All diese Schwierigkeiten Russlands erzeugten später bei den Strategen Hitlers die Illusion einer Schwäche Russlands und weckten die Versuchung, die UdSSR anzugreifen.
Police fired rubber bullets and tear gas during a fifth consecutive day of unrest in Tirana, as student demonstrations over corruption, employment and education developed into a nationwide challenge to the government.
Albania’s political crisis deepened on Saturday, 17th October, as violent anti-government protests continued for a fifth consecutive day, with demonstrators attacking police and public buildings in the capital, Tirana, and demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Edi Rama.
Police used tear gas, water cannon and rubber bullets to disperse protesters outside the Ministry of Education after groups of masked demonstrators threw stones, petrol bombs and fireworks at security forces. The disturbances subsequently spread through the city centre, including areas near the prime minister’s office.
According to the latest figures released by Albanian police, 167 people had been arrested and 132 officers injured during five days of unrest. Seven police officers were also suspended pending investigations into allegations of excessive force.
The demonstrations have become one of the most serious domestic challenges to Rama since his Socialist Party came to power in 2013.
Students transform an environmental protest into a political movement
The current unrest grew out of a campaign known as the Flamingo movement, which began earlier this year in opposition to a controversial luxury tourism development associated with Jared Kushner, the son-in-law of US President Donald Trump.
The development attracted objections from local residents and environmental campaigners concerned about land ownership, planning decisions and potential damage to protected coastal areas.
What began as a dispute over tourism development subsequently expanded into a wider protest against alleged government corruption, unemployment, education standards and the cost of living.
The involvement of high-school and university students has considerably increased both the scale and political significance of the demonstrations.
Students have demanded improvements to educational facilities, additional financial support and better employment opportunities for graduates. Frustration over the limited prospects available to young Albanians has also brought emigration into the debate.
During Saturday’s demonstrations, protesters burned a suitcase outside the Education Ministry, using it as a symbol of the pressure on young people to leave Albania in search of work.
The protests began peacefully before violence erupted when masked participants attacked police positions.
According to accounts from Tirana, government offices, banks and commercial premises have been damaged during several days of confrontations.
Demonstrations have also spread beyond Tirana to other Albanian cities.
Rama refuses to resign
Rama, who is serving his fourth term as prime minister, has rejected demands for his resignation and accused political opponents of encouraging violence to destabilise the government.
He has acknowledged the right of citizens to demonstrate but insisted that attacks on public institutions and private property cannot be treated as legitimate political protest.
The government has pledged to prosecute those responsible for vandalism and assaults on police officers.
National Police Chief Skender Hita has defended the security operation, arguing that officers have faced repeated attacks by masked groups. At the same time, the suspension of seven officers indicates that allegations concerning police conduct are being investigated.
The political opposition has sought to capitalise on the unrest, although the Flamingo movement initially developed outside Albania’s established party structures.
That distinction complicates the government’s argument that the demonstrations are primarily the result of opposition-party activity.
The protests have also exposed tensions between the government’s economic development policies and opposition from communities concerned about corruption, land rights and access to employment.
EU accession adds another dimension
The crisis comes at a particularly sensitive moment in Albania’s negotiations to join the European Union.
The agreement marked another step towards membership, bringing the number of provisionally completed negotiating chapters to four out of 33.
Albania has already opened all 33 chapters, placing it among the more advanced candidates in the Western Balkans.
However, the EU’s negotiating framework makes clear that progress on fundamental reforms, including judicial independence, democratic institutions and the rule of law, determines the overall pace of accession.
As EU Today recently reported, Brussels is considering additional safeguards designed to prevent democratic backsliding following enlargement.
The current protests do not automatically jeopardise Albania’s accession negotiations. Public demonstrations, including those directed against an elected government, are not themselves evidence of a failure to meet democratic standards.
The relevant questions for Brussels concern the authorities’ response, the independence of investigations into police conduct, the treatment of detainees and whether allegations of corruption are properly examined.
These matters fall directly within the EU’s assessment of the rule of law and the functioning of democratic institutions.
A political test ahead of possible EU membership
Rama has made EU membership by 2030 a central objective of his government, presenting accession as the foundation of Albania’s future economic and political development.
The acceleration of negotiations has given his administration a substantial diplomatic achievement. It has not, however, resolved dissatisfaction over domestic governance or living standards.
The growing involvement of students also means the demonstrations are no longer confined to the environmental dispute that originally triggered the movement.
For the European Commission, the immediate challenge is to maintain a credible distinction between technical progress in accession negotiations and its assessment of political developments inside the candidate country.
For Rama, the question is whether he can restore public order without intensifying opposition to a government that has been in office for more than 13 years.
Further demonstrations would place additional pressure on the authorities, particularly if the movement continues to spread beyond the capital and attracts broader support from trade unions, students and other dissatisfied groups.
More than half a million people took part in demonstrations across France on Saturday, 17 October, as protests over living costs and education deteriorated into riots, looting and attacks on public buildings in several major cities.
France is assessing extensive damage following nationwide demonstrations on Saturday, 17 October, that brought hundreds of thousands of people onto the streets and resulted in more than 1,200 arrests. Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu said 150 police officers and gendarmes were injured as violent groups attacked public buildings, looted businesses and confronted security forces.
According to figures released by the French authorities, approximately 550,000 people participated in 110 marches across France, including 110,000 in Paris. Organisers, including trade unions and student associations, placed nationwide participation at 800,000.
The demonstrations represented a considerable escalation of the movement that began in September over deteriorating conditions in French secondary schools. The protests have since expanded into a broader campaign against rising living costs, public spending restrictions and the government’s economic policies.
Violence spreads beyond Paris
In the French capital, confrontations erupted around Place de la République, where masked groups threw paving stones, fireworks and other projectiles at police. Security forces responded with tear gas and water cannon as vehicles and rubbish bins were set alight.
Businesses along Boulevard Magenta and neighbouring streets were targeted, with shops broken into and goods stolen. Several central Paris Métro stations were closed as authorities attempted to restrict access to sensitive government locations.
Although the main authorised procession remained largely peaceful, violence continued elsewhere in the capital into Saturday evening.
The disturbances extended well beyond Paris. In Limoges, the historic town hall suffered extensive fire damage, with parts of its roof collapsing. Regional authorities described the destruction of the 143-year-old building as a major loss to the city’s architectural heritage.
In Marseille, groups forced their way into the town hall after using street barriers to ram its entrance. Municipal premises were vandalised before police regained control.
Further incidents were reported in Lyon, where a tourist office was attacked and a fire started, and in Bordeaux, where the official residence of the Gironde prefect was ransacked. Police also reported attacks or attempted break-ins at public buildings in Lille, Calais and Brest. The scale of the disturbances placed security forces under considerable pressure.
Government blames organised extremist groups
Lecornu accused organised far-left groups of deliberately instigating violence in several French cities. Nuñez similarly attributed much of the destruction to radical groups and individuals exploiting the demonstrations to loot businesses.
President Emmanuel Macron condemned attacks on public property and commercial premises, promising that those responsible would face prosecution.
The government has not announced a state of emergency, although authorities are reviewing the scale of the damage and the security response.
The mayor of Paris, Emmanuel Grégoire, described the destruction across parts of the capital as extensive and distinguished the peaceful protest movement from those responsible for vandalism.
Student unrest becomes a national movement
Saturday’s demonstrations followed several weeks of disruption across France’s education system.
As EU Today reported earlier this month, between 400 and 500 secondary schools faced partial or complete closures as students protested against teacher shortages, overcrowded classrooms and deteriorating facilities.
The subsequent confrontations with police intensified political tensions, with student organisations accusing authorities of using excessive force and police representatives complaining of inadequate protection.
A further controversy emerged on Saturday after a 17-year-old demonstrator in Saint-Étienne suffered a serious hand injury. An investigation was opened into the incident and assigned to France’s police inspectorate, the IGPN. Reports linked the injury to a grenade thrown by police; the precise circumstances remain under investigation.
The latest demonstrations also marked a revival of the Gilets Jaunes, or Yellow Vest, movement, which emerged in 2018 in opposition to fuel taxation and subsequently developed into a wider challenge to Macron’s economic programme.
Trade unions, including the CGT, joined calls for higher wages and pensions, lower consumer prices and increased investment in public services.
Political consequences for Macron and Lecornu
The unrest presents another challenge for Lecornu’s government as it attempts to manage France’s public finances ahead of the 2027 presidential election.
The demands for increased spending on education, wages and public services come as ministers face pressure to reduce the budget deficit and control public debt.
The political implications are already apparent. Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of the hard-left France Unbowed movement, has supported the student protests while opposing looting and destruction. Marine Le Pen has condemned the rioters and accused Mélenchon’s party of helping to legitimise the unrest.
The latest disturbances also follow growing criticism of the government’s policing strategy, particularly the use of riot-control weapons during demonstrations involving minors.
With municipal authorities calculating the cost of damage to public buildings and commercial premises, Lecornu has instructed ministers to support affected businesses. The immediate challenge is to restore public order while addressing a protest movement that has expanded considerably beyond its original demands for improvements in French schools.
Police used tear gas to push back people wearing hoods and masks and throwing fireworks at officers in the Place de la République, northeast of the Paris city center.
Police used tear gas to push back people wearing hoods and masks and throwing fireworks at officers in the Place de la République, northeast of the Paris city center.
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