France, pounded by protests, seeks answersMacron to address nation Monday
By Sean Philip Cotter | Boston Herald
December 9, 2018 at 10:03 pm
French President Emmanuel Macron is preparing to break nearly a month’s silence in the face of increasingly agitated and violent protests spurred by populist anger at what’s seen as a government that’s cast the working people aside.
Running battles between “yellow vest†protesters and police that left at least 71 injured in the French capital and caused widespread damage in cities around France raged Saturday for the fourth weekend in a row.
The list of grievances by the largely rural, lower-middle class protesters clad in yellow emergency vests is myriad and growing, but is largely based around measures to increase buying power.
“It’s working people and lower-middle-class people mostly because you have seen a wage stagnation in most of these European countries and unemployment across the board,†Celia Belin, a French-American foreign policy analyst at the Brookings Institute, told the Herald. “It becomes a question of social justice and dignity.â€
Belin, who’s from Dijon, said Macron already had made some unpopular moves before the gas tax, including levies on pensioners and cuts to housing subsidies. ...
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