Former French MEP Florian Philippot has sarcastically reacted to the recent White House remarks about violent protests in France over the pension reform.
“Extremely funny! Macron may play the poodle for the Americans, but the latter have just officially and publicly humiliated him by criticizing the violence against demonstrators in our country! The poodle is not rewarded but scolded! So much the better,” Philippot, who is also leader of France's Eurosceptic party The Patriots, tweeted.
French police officers, including one using a flashlight, operate in riot gear during a demonstration in support to victims of police brutality, after events in Sainte-Soline and in pension protests, in Nantes, western France, on March 30, 2023
© AFP 2023 / SEBASTIEN SALOM-GOMIS
This came a few days after White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby made it clear that the Biden administration supports a global right to protest peacefully as the French continued to express outrage over President Emmanuel Macron's unpopular pension reform and police brutality.
"We support the right of people to protest and to express their opinions and to demonstrate peacefully there as we would anywhere," Kirby said when asked about the situation in France.
He spoke as about 740,000 protesters joined 240 rallies held across France on Tuesday, with more than 93,000 demonstrators filling the streets of the capital alone, according to the French Interior Ministry.
One of the country’s major trade unions, the General Confederation of Labour (CGT), estimated a total nearly five times the ministry’s figure for Paris, namely, 450,000 protesters. They clashed with riot police, who used tear gas to clear some areas.
The Tuesday riots were the latest in a series of such protests that have been in place in France since January.
The decision, which President Macron argues is necessary to keep the French pension system viable, sparked a strong backlash, prompting people to take to the streets across the country.