(Brussels) Clashes erupted on Sunday during a large demonstration against new anti-COVID-19 measures in Brussels, as the Netherlands experienced their third consecutive evening of unrest over opposition to health restrictions.
The COVID-19 pandemic is accelerating in Europe, which has once again become the epicenter of the epidemic, pushing governments to decree more or less strict restrictions, until the re-containment of the population in Austria, where thousands of people have again demonstrated their opposition Sunday.
Nine of the 10 countries recording the biggest accelerations of the week are located on the Old Continent. In proportion to the population, excluding micro-states, the country with the most new cases remains Slovenia (1,107 per 100,000 inhabitants), ahead of Austria (981) and Croatia (887).
Water cannons and tear gas
The Belgian march started peacefully but the police then used water cannons and tear gas in front of a group of people throwing projectiles that they charged, an AFP photographer found.
The latter saw at least two police officers injured during the clashes, and a protester evacuated by ambulance. Several demonstrators wore hoods and Flemish nationalist flags, others with yellow stars reminiscent of the Nazi occupation.
Some 35,000 people, according to the police, took part in this march against the new anti-COVID-19 measures, under the slogan “Together for freedom”.
Belgium, which has decreed the generalization of the wearing of masks, also wants to make telework compulsory for jobs allowing it, to halt the strong epidemic rebound – nearly 10,300 new infections per day on average over the week, a more attained rate. since a year.
In the Netherlands, thugs have engaged in degradation for the third consecutive evening, on the sidelines of demonstrations against anti-COVID-19 measures.
PHOTO SVEN SIMCIC – VIDEO IN VERZET, VIA REUTERS
In the Netherlands, thugs have engaged in degradation for the third consecutive evening, on the sidelines of demonstrations against anti-COVID-19 measures.
In Enschede, on the German border, a state of emergency has been declared and “five people have just been arrested in the city center”, tweeted the local police, calling on the demonstrators to “go home”.
Protesters also fired fireworks and damaged the cities of Groningen and Leeuwarden (north), and Tilburg in the south, according to local law enforcement and media.
“The police are present in the center of Groningen,” which “several small groups of people are vandalizing,” said a police spokeswoman.
The unrest started on Friday in the Netherlands in the port city of Rotterdam (southwest), where four protesters were injured by police gunfire and 51 people arrested.
Several police officers were then injured in clashes with protesters in The Hague on Saturday evening. Violence broke out the same evening in Urk (center) and in several localities in the province of Limburg (south).
More than 100 people have been arrested and at least 12 injured in the past three days.
In Austria, around 6,000 people, according to the police, demonstrated in calm Sunday afternoon in Linz (north) against anti-COVID-19 measures, the day after a massive mobilization in Vienna which had attracted 40,000 protesters.
Cases have reached unprecedented levels since spring 2020 in Austria, the first country to re-contain its population completely, from Monday, and the first EU member to make vaccination compulsory for everyone from February.
The rally was organized at the call of a new political party opposed to the restrictions, the MFG (“Menschen Freiheit Grundrechte” – “Humanity, Freedom, Fundamental Rights”), which recently entered the regional parliament.
Police reinforcements
Less affected on its metropolitan territory by the opposition to anti-COVID-19 measures, France had to send police reinforcements to its island of Guadeloupe, in the Caribbean, after a new night of violence originating from the contestation of the vaccination obligation of caregivers, which degenerated into a major social crisis.
Like the day before, the night from Saturday to Sunday was agitated, between roadblocks, fires, looting and shooting at the police and firefighters, which led to 38 arrests and left two injured among the forces of the order.
These incidents took place despite the night curfew decreed in this department of about 400,000 inhabitants, located 600 km northeast of the coast of South America.
For the prefecture of Guadeloupe, “organized gangs are now looking for chaos”.
In particular, food stores and pharmacies were looted. “Each time, a barricade placed upstream prevented us from advancing,” said French gendarmes. A police station was set on fire in Morne-à-l’Eau (north).