In France, tens of thousands of people demonstrated against the stricter corona rules on Saturday for the sixth weekend in a row.
Around 200 protest marches had been called across the country.
These were mostly peaceful, in Montpellier in the south of France there were wrangling between left and right participants in a demonstration, as can be seen on television pictures.
Apart from compulsory vaccination for health care workers, the protests were directed against the so-called health passport for proof of vaccination, recovery or a negative test.
The health pass, which can be saved in the nationwide Corona app, has been required for two weeks, among other things, for visiting cafes and restaurants, before entering large shopping centers and when traveling by long-distance train or plane.
For German tourists, the certificates issued at home are generally sufficient.
Unlike in Germany, the easing of restrictions in France in the past few months has not been linked to compulsory testing.
So far, the use of the health pass has been running smoothly for the most part.
Expressions of solidarity for doctor Raoult
At some demonstrations there were also expressions of solidarity with the biologist and physician Didier Raoult, who is popular with conspiracy theorists but also widely respected.
A few days ago it became known that Raoult would lose all of his functions at the University Medical Center Marseille (IHU) when he reached the retirement age of 69 years.
Skeptics of the French corona policy suspect that a critical voice is to be silenced.
"Hands off Raoult" was written on posters during a demonstration in Paris.
Among other things, Raoult had campaigned for the drug hydroxychloroquine in the fight against Covid-19.
In Pau in the south of France, Jérôme Rodrigues, one of the symbolic figures of the “yellow vests” movement, said: “Get vaccinated if you want, but we are against a permit for the hospital or for shopping, we are calling for the law to be repealed”.
In Paris, the former chief strategist of right-wing populist Marine Le Pen, Florian Philippot, spoke to a crowd of flag-waving supporters.
They wrote “No to the health pass” and “Let's liberate France” on signs.
Philippot's new movement "Les Patriotes" organized one of the four demonstrations in the French capital, and the "yellow vests" movement had registered two more.
The protests, which have been going on since mid-July, unite a wide range of critics of the corona policy of President Emmanuel Macron's government. Last Saturday there was a total of 217 rallies, according to the Interior Ministry, almost 215,000 people took part. The protests on August 7th had the highest number of participants to date of 237,000 people.