France student protest arrests top 5,000

Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez said 85% of those detained since September 28 are minors.

The Turkiye Times Editorial DeskOctober 04, 2026, 04:41 PMUpdated: October 04, 2026, 07:38 PM

France student protest arrests top 5,000

More than 5,000 people have been arrested in connection with high school blockades in France since Monday, September 28, Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez said, including 1,747 on Friday, October 2, alone. Nuñez said 85% of those detained were minors, most of them high school students.

French Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez

A student blockade outside the Buffon high school in Paris (archive, December 2024)

Students began demonstrating outside their schools in late September over teacher shortages, class sizes and school conditions, and the movement quickly spread nationwide. Student organizations have vowed to continue the mobilization, with a new day of action called for Tuesday, October 6.

24 high schools burned or ransacked

French Education Minister Édouard Geffray said on France Inter and France 2 on Sunday that 24 high schools had been “burned or ransacked” across France on the sidelines of the protests and blockades, and that 78 members of Education Ministry staff had been injured. He said classes would remain suspended on Monday in 400 to 500 high schools. The high school protest movement began on Sept. 17.