French school protests resume on smaller scale as holidays end

French student protests resumed on Monday ⁠on a much smaller scale than in past weeks as pupils returned from a two-week break, with youngsters trying to blockade a few high schools in Paris, Marseille and Rennes, French media reported.

By 0830 GMT ‌some 41 high schools – about 1 per cent of those nationwide – were blockaded, the Education Ministry said.

Hundreds of France’s more than 3,000 high schools were blockaded in the weeks before the break. The protests, which began in the Paris suburbs in September, have spread across France and broadened beyond education to focus on ⁠the cost of living, drawing in trade unionists and activists and sometimes turning violent.