A toddler was hospitalized after a firework struck the child’s stroller during massive student protests outside Paris on Tuesday.
The one-year-old, who was near a school in Saint-Cyr-l’École on the outskirts of Versailles, was treated for tinnitus following the incident, police said. A high school student participating in the demonstrations was arrested in connection with the attack, according to France’s RMC radio.
The injury came on what France’s students’ union described as the largest day of the current protests to date, with at least 2,000 schools blockaded or closed Wednesday. An estimated 450,000 people swarmed streets across the country in violent clashes with police, the demonstrations having swelled from a call to address poor conditions in France’s underfunded school system into some of the most explosive unrest the nation has seen in decades.
Education Minister Édouard Geffray told French lawmakers Wednesday that 24 schools had been set ablaze or vandalized so severely they would shut for several weeks, impacting at least 30,000 students.
The toddler was not the only civilian caught in the crosshairs. A 16-year-old student was arrested after allegedly dousing a science teacher with gasoline in La Ciotat. Footage of the Friday incident shows an inferno blazing in the street near La Méditerranée high school after three people set fire to a tree outside the school’s gate.
The teacher is seen trying to chase away the students before one throws a bucket of gasoline at him just feet from the blaze. When the teacher tries to back away from the flames, the student runs up behind him and kicks the man before fleeing.
Police confirmed several teachers and headmasters have had gasoline dumped on them in recent weeks, with the La Ciotat attack mimicking other encounters across the country.
Tensions escalated further after a 15-year-old’s hand was blown off Monday by a police stun grenade, sparking outrage at the government’s crackdown. Protesters at the Place de la Nation in Paris chanted, “We are all anti-fascists” and waved “ACAB” signs slamming law enforcement.
“Everyone hates the police,” was also chanted, with one banner in Paris reading, “A state that gasses high school students is a weak state.”
French Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu fired back at criticism of police conduct. “What triggers police action is the occurrence of urban violence,” he said in a statement.
More than 6,500 people have been arrested so far, officials said, as police have deployed tear gas and water cannons against protesters.
The unrest has drawn international attention for its intensity and duration, with the economic grievances fueling student anger now spilling into broader confrontations with authorities across French cities.