Europe 1 with AFP 21:04 p.m., March 17, 2023

The Place de la Concorde in Paris is the scene, as the day before, of a gathering of demonstrators who protest against the use of 49.3 to pass the pension reform. Some 2,500 people gathered in front of the National Assembly, after several actions by high school and university students during the day.

Some 2,500 demonstrators gathered Friday night at Place de la Concorde in Paris, as the day before, to protest against the pension reform and the use of article 49.3, after several actions of high school and university students during the day. The crowd swelled around 19 p.m., in a previously rather calm atmosphere, according to AFP journalists. Clara, 22, participated in all the demonstrations. "It's important to be here, I'm afraid the movement will run out of steam," the student, who did not want to give her last name, told AFP.

FLASH | The demonstrators chant: "it's going to fart, it's going to fart" on the Place de la #Concorde against the #ReformeDesRetraites. #directAN#manif17mars

@xztim_pic.twitter.com/1hWKu92ZaO

— Cerfia (@CerfiaFR) March 17, 2023

About fifteen university sites blocked all over France

A little earlier, some 200 people, mainly young people, had gathered in front of the police station of the 1st arrondissement of Paris, where two students arrested in the morning near Tolbiac were placed in custody. Throughout France, fifteen university sites were blocked on Friday (Nanterre, Cassin center of Paris 1 or Mulhouse) and twenty others occupied (Bordeaux Montaigne, Lyon 2 ...), according to the student union L'Alternative, at the forefront of this movement.

>> READ ALSO – Pensions: Paris marked by the traces of the demonstrations after the passage in force of the 49.3

In Paris, students gathered at the end of the morning in front of the Tolbiac site of the University of Paris 1, administratively blocked as a preventive measure, joined by others who had found themselves at the Sorbonne Square. The students (between 150 and 400 according to them) tried to organize an improvised demonstration, to support striking garbage collectors at the incinerator of Ivry-sur-Seine, but the movement was quickly repressed by the police, they said.

High schools blocked Paris

Some high schools were also blocked on Friday, such as Turgot and Henri-IV high schools in Paris. "The principle of 49.3 is really undemocratic," said Raphaëlle, 16, in the first class at Henri-IV, adding that "it is symbolic to make this blockade here today, because it was Macron's high school."

>> READ ALSO – "An insult to the French": the use of 49.3 by Elisabeth Borne divides the population

"We managed to mobilize all the students. It really shows that there is consensus," added Nina, 16, also a freshman at the high school. On Thursday, more than 1,600 young people had marched from the Sorbonne before joining other demonstrators at Place de la Concorde, not far from the National Assembly where Elisabeth Borne triggered article 49.3.