France: Car crashes into farmers' protest block: a woman and her 14 year old daughter killed, her husband injured

January 23, 2024, 9:22 am

The three people in the vehicle were arrested. The demonstration has been going on across the country for days. The blockade of the road where the accident occurred in Pamiers has been lifted. But the dispute is expanding

Afp

TO Pamiers, in southwest Franceone Woman and that Daughter 14-year-old demonstrates at one French farmers checkpoint they stayed killed after being hit by a car that was speeding toward the group of demonstrators. The woman's husband and the girl's father, also among the protesters, were seriously injured. The three occupants of the car were arrested. French farmers have been demonstrating across the country for several days to demand administrative simplifications and faster compensation for natural disasters.

Father in serious condition According to Bfmtv, the emergency services were able to save the man. His condition would be serious.

The checkpoint was lifted after the accident “At the particular moment in which agriculture finds itself, such a drama is difficult to bear,” the leader of the farmers' union Arnaud Rousseau told Rmc, announcing the end of the blockade on National Road 20, the site of the accident.

Farmers, the protest is spreading In the meantime, however, the protest movement is expanding to new roads and highways after a meeting with the government without much result. On the night of Monday to Tuesday, around thirty tractors with trailers blocked traffic on the A7 motorway in both directions, between Lyon and Valence, in the center of the country. The inconvenience for motorists was great as they were diverted to alternate roads where long queues formed.

Meanwhile, further protests are blocking the A64 and A63 motorways in the French Pyrenees. Access to Spain remains possible for the time being, while the A62 in Aquitaine in the southwest of the country remains blocked by around ten tractors.

Problems for trains too There are also problems for rail transport as dozens of farmers have accumulated tires on the tracks, again in New Aquitaine. The situation in the east of the country is also becoming increasingly complicated, with blockades on the border with Germany, near the Saar Bridge.

No comment from Attal President Rousseau said on Monday before the meeting with the executive branch that he expected a statement from Prime Minister Gabriel Attal “that would significantly change the situation.” And yet at the end of the confrontation there was no statement.

The reasons for the protest Farmers complain that they are overwhelmed by bureaucracy and that their living standards are deteriorating. The main demands include administrative simplification, a no to new bans on pesticides, a halt to diesel price increases for tractors and agricultural vehicles, immediate compensation in the event of natural disasters and the full implementation of the law for better pay for agricultural workers by industrialists and wholesalers.

Fear of escalation For his part, Prime Minister Attal has promised to “make life easier for workers in the sector”, but the government fears an escalation of the protest, also in view of the initiatives similar to the French ones that are taking place in Holland, Romania, Germany or Poland, often against tax increases and the European “Green Deal”.

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