Violence, chaos and fear on the streets of France: Conflicts are not abating VIDEO

Violence, chaos and fear on the streets of France: Conflicts are not abating VIDEO

Clashes broke out in Paris next to a Left Bank pub favored by French President Emmanuel Macron, Reuters reported.

The awning of the Café de la Rotonde was briefly set on fire.

There, the protesters threw stones, bottles and paint at the police. The cafe is well known in France as Macron hosted a celebratory dinner there after leading the first round of the 2017 presidential election. The police used tear gas twice at a protest in Lyon and once in Nantes, reports BFMTV reporters. Protests in other cities across France were largely peaceful.

The conversation between French Prime Minister Elizabeth Bourne and the unions lasted for an hour yesterday and did not bring the desired solution.

The unions stated that the only way out of the crisis is to withdraw the law, which the president of the French government firmly rejected.

"There is no other solution than withdrawing the reform," said the leader of the CGT trade union, Sophie Binet, at the beginning of the protest in Paris.

Laurent Berger, the leader of the country's largest trade union CFDT has called on as many workers as possible to join the marches across France, which will be held tomorrow.

"We are in a social crisis, a democratic crisis," Berger told RTL radio.

The previous demonstration on March 28 had a lower turnout, with around 740,000 people protesting across the country, according to the Interior Ministry, compared to a record 1.28 million on March 7. The civil aviation authority has asked airlines to reduce the number of flights by 20 percent in cities such as Bordeaux and Marseille, but not at Paris airports as during previous strikes in mid-January.

It is also expected that around 20 percent of primary school teachers will join the strike, local media reported.

In 106 out of 3,720 secondary schools, classes will be completely or partially interrupted.

Due to the strikes, the work of oil refineries and nuclear power plants is still partially interrupted, while the garbage collectors have decided to continue their protest from next week.