the demonstration against the A69 motorway turns into a confrontation

In Saturday’s demonstration, some demonstrators judge that “all modes of action are legitimate” to fight against the A69 motorway project, criticized for its negative environmental consequences.

A prohibited demonstration, under close surveillance in the Tarn. 1,600 people, according to the prefecture, demonstrated on Saturday June 8 against the project to build the A69 motorway between Castres and Toulouse, at the call of environmental associations. The organizers counted 7,000 people present who came to denounce the environmental consequences of the project. In front of the demonstrators, around 1,600 gendarmes and police officers were dispatched and this degenerated into clashes.

Throughout the afternoon, the fields were covered in thick clouds of tear gas. On one side, a few hundred radical activists, all dressed in black, with masks on their faces, some equipped with shields made of sheet metal. On the other, hundreds of police officers and gendarmes. Two gendarmes and a police officer were slightly injured, according to the prefecture, one of them was hit by a burst of Molotov cocktails and the other by mortar fire. “Two injured demonstrators were treated by firefighters”, she added, one of which was due to a leg injury. He was evacuated on a stretcher.

“The delinquents, the terrorists, it is the public authorities who destroy nature illegally.”

environmental activist against the A69

franceinfo

These clashes were concentrated, in particular at the bottom of a hill, under the gaze of demonstrators gathered at the top. Many of them justify this violence: “The people who are demonstrating today are acting in a state of necessity and therefore all modes of action to prevent this project have legitimacy, even legality.” The activist goes on to say that “the delinquents, the terrorists, it is the public authorities who destroy nature illegally”. According to him : “every citizen not only has the right, but has the duty to mobilize to protect the environment”.

However, the atmosphere was initially relaxed on Saturday morning. Some activists spent the night there, others arrived in the morning. Everyone is opposed to this A69 motorway project which, according to environmental associations, would tarmac at least 300 hectares of nature: a “ecological disaster” and one “anachronistic project”, denounce these demonstrators coming from all over France, some even from Brittany. Farmers were also present in the demonstration under the flags of the Peasant Confederation. This highway would affect 1,000 farms according to the union and certain farms, certain land, would be cut in two by this highway.

After several hours of tension, the procession turned back towards the field from which it had left at midday, in the rain and still under the gaze of the police helicopter.