How high school protests in France turned into a wide-scale security crisis leading to thousands of arrests

The French capital and other cities have witnessed a week-long wave of student protests, which resulted in the closure of about 400 high schools across the country on Friday, according to official authorities.

Causes and student motivations

The spark of the protests began last week in the Paris region and quickly spread to the rest of the French provinces. Senior high school students are protesting against what they describe as excessively long study hours, in addition to poor conditions within educational institutions, pointing to high temperatures in classrooms and frequent staff absences.

Government stance and official reactions

The French government acknowledged that the student complaints are legitimate, but simultaneously emphasized its categorical rejection of acts of violence. In this context, French Education Minister Édouard Geffray stated that “the high school student movement has become a hostage to extremely violent marginal groups,” explaining that about 400 high schools out of 3,700 in the country were expected to close their doors, with many institutions moving toward organizing distance learning, especially in the city of Marseille.

Strict security and judicial measures

On the security and judicial front, Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin confirmed that he had asked public prosecutors to hold parents accountable for the damages caused by their children during the protests, and to force them to “pay the costs of repairs.” Darmanin explained, in statements to the “RTL” radio station, that about two thousand people have been placed in police custody since the start of the protest movement, noting that “90 percent of them are minors.”