French school protests resume on small scale as students return from break

High school students in France have resumed protests on a much smaller scale than in previous weeks as pupils returned from their two-week holiday break. The Ministry of Education said 41 high schools were blockaded on Monday, about one percent of the country’s 3,700, according to the French public broadcaster Franceinfo. Students attempted to blockade schools in Paris, Marseille and Rennes, the Reuters news agency reported. Hundreds of schools were blockaded in the weeks before the break. “In terms of blockades, or attempted blockades, the phenomenon is very marginal. We’re talking about a handful of units, a few individual schools,” Education Minister Edouard Geffray told France Inter radio.