The police mobilized against anti-vaccination pass convoys in Paris

"Thank you to the police officers engaged all night".

Shortly after midnight, the Paris Police Prefecture (PP) greeted in a tweet the police mobilized to prevent any motorized demonstration in the city.

Nearly 7,200 police and gendarmes "are deployed over the next 3 days to enforce the bans on vehicle convoys", according to the PP.

The prefect of police Didier Lallement has "created a certain number of temporary pounds which (...) will allow with several dozen towing vehicles to put an end to any blockage", he declared.

Gendarmerie armored vehicles have also been deployed in the capital, a first since the demonstrations of "yellow vests" at the end of 2018.

Prime Minister Jean Castex has promised to be inflexible in the face of the movement.

"If they block traffic or if they try to block the capital, you have to be very firm," he insisted on France 2 television news.

The hundreds of cars, motorhomes and vans leaving from Lille, Strasbourg, Vimy (Pas-de-Calais) or Châteaubourg (Ille-et-Vilaine) stopped Friday evening at the gates of Paris, a police source claiming that no convoy entered the capital.

"Phenomenal scale"

A lot of fatigue and the beginning of nervousness were felt in the procession leaving from Brittany, which stopped in the parking lot of a shopping center on the outskirts of Chartres framed by squadrons of mobile gendarmerie, according to a journalist from the AFP.

"We are all collectively tired by what we have been going through for two years. This fatigue is expressed in several ways: by disarray in some, depression in others. We see a very strong mental suffering, in our young people and less young. And sometimes, this fatigue also translates into anger. I hear it and respect it, "said President Macron in an interview with the daily Ouest-France.

Paris police chief Didier Lallement (center) talks to police officers and supervises the checks on vehicles as they arrive at Porte d'Orléans in southern Paris on February 11, 2022 Sameer Al-DOUMY AFP

"But", he added, "I call for the greatest calm".

The police had estimated in the afternoon at 3,300 the number of vehicles involved in the convoys, including a thousand on the RN20 from Orleans and 500 on the A10-A11 motorway from Le Mans.

It is an action "on a phenomenal scale", told AFP a coordinator of the movement.

A demonstrator supporting the anti-vaccination pass convoys in front of a gendarmerie armored car, on February 11, 2022 place Denfert-Rochereau in Paris Sameer Al-DOUMY AFP

The ban on gathering convoys was upheld on Friday evening by the Paris administrative court, which rejected two appeals.

"It's a betrayal. The foundations of the decree are not respectful of the law, of the freedom to demonstrate", reacted to AFP the anti-vaccine activist and "yellow vest" Sophie Tissier.

"European Convergence"

"The right to demonstrate and to have an opinion are a constitutionally guaranteed right in our Republic and in our democracy. The right to block others or to prevent coming and going is not," replied Jean Castex. .

Two months before the presidential election, the demonstrators demand the withdrawal of the vaccination pass and defend claims on purchasing power or the cost of energy.

An anti-health pass protester during a stop in her convoy in Chartres, near Paris, on February 11, 2022 JEAN-FRANCOIS MONIER AFP

The government says it plans to lift the vaccination pass by the end of March or the beginning of April.

Refuting for their part any desire to block the capital, the participants hope to swell the ranks of the processions against the vaccine pass organized each week on Saturday.

"It's important not to disturb other users, to keep the population on our side, like in Canada", launched Robin, from a parking lot in Illkirch-Graffenstaden, in the suburbs of Strasbourg.

Some demonstrators then intend to reach Brussels for a "European convergence" scheduled for Monday 14 February.

The Belgian authorities have banned access to the capital.

On Friday, others were also spreading calls to occupy roundabouts.

"I appeal to join all the big cities to occupy them, multiply the gathering points", launched in a video one of the initiators of the movement, Rémi Monde.

burx-ao/roc

© 2022 AFP