Toulouse-Castres motorway: six arrests during a demonstration

Europe 1 with AFP // Photo credit: Alain Pitton / NurPhoto / NurPhoto via AFP 9:56 p.m., February 18, 2024

Six opponents of the Toulouse-Castres motorway project were arrested on Sunday during a banned demonstration in Saïx, in Tarn, which gave rise to incidents with the gendarmes, according to consistent sources. While the police have been surrounding the trees on which opponents are camped since Saturday to prevent the continuation of the construction site, the demonstrators wanted to supply these activists, according to Bernard Cottaz, member of the Voie est libre collective, opposed to this project. highway.

Three gendarmes were injured and six demonstrators arrested

According to the prefecture, which had banned this demonstration, "150 people violently attacked the police, targeted by Molotov cocktail jets", which La Voie est libre denies, citing "massive use of tear gas" by the police. Three gendarmes were injured and six demonstrators arrested, according to the prefecture. At the same time, two construction machines from a cement factory several hundred meters from the Zone to Defend (ZAD) created by the opponents were "set on fire by demonstrators", according to the prefecture.

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According to Bernard Cottaz, "there was indeed a fire, but not at all where the demonstrators were." For Gérald Darmanin, "the police have been facing great violence for several days from those seeking to reconstitute a new ZAD on the A69 work site." However, adds the Minister of the Interior on X, "no ZAD will be tolerated." Atosca, the concessionaire designated by the State, believes that since February 15 it has the right to resume tree cutting on the route.

For the Way is free, the wood occupied by the zadists being of “strong environmental importance”, it can only be cleared between September 1 and October 15. Four associations thus filed an “environmental criminal summary” on February 9 with the Toulouse public prosecutor’s office to prohibit the resumption of land clearing. On Friday, several associations, including Attac and the LDH, denounced "excesses" by the police around the ZAD, accusing them in particular of depriving activists camping on the trees of any possibility of supply. Contacted by AFP, the prefecture did not wish to comment on this subject.