Protesting pupils blockade French high schools again, testing a weekslong movement

PARIS (AP) — Protesting pupils blockaded their high schools again Tuesday and adult demonstrators marched in support of the teenagers' weeks-old nationwide movement demanding more resources for the school system.

At the Hélène Boucher lycée, or high school, in Paris' 20th district, protesters tipped trash cans and bicycles on their sides to create a makeshift barricade in front of the school.

Like hundreds of others around the country, the school was closed. Authorities began shutting schools last week to take some steam out of the demonstrations after widespread damage to schools and mounting injuries among staff, students and police.

French media reported protests in other cities and towns on Tuesday morning. Flag- and placard-waving demonstrators responded to labor union calls for workers to march in support of the high school movement that is rattling the government of President Emmanuel Macron.

“You say ‘young people are the future’ so listen to them,” read a handwritten placard attached to a metal barrier outside a Paris school.

Interior Minister Laurent Nunez defended the government's muscular response, despite a growing list of gruesome injuries to young protesters blamed on police riot-control weapons. The latest was Monday, with a 15-year-old who lost a hand, seemingly ripped off by a police stun grenade.

Nunez said the police response to the protests has been proportionate in “almost all cases.”

The widespread use of arrests, tear gas and riot-control weapons against teenagers is fueling defiance and angering some parents and teachers. Officers have made more than 6,100 arrests, and 715 officers have been injured, Nunez said.

At Hélène Boucher on Tuesday, parents and other adults positioned themselves between protesters and police keeping watch.

School blockades and protests began in the Paris region in mid-September before spreading to other cities and towns. Demonstrators have voiced a range of grievances, often centering on a lack of resources and opportunities for students in disadvantaged schools despite the promise of France’s national motto: “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity.”

Students have drawn attention to rundown classrooms that lack basics such as desks and chairs, become sweltering in summer without air conditioning and, in some cases, are infested with rats. Other common complaints include staff shortages and exhausting workloads. French high school students’ compulsory classroom hours are among the highest in Europe.

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Associated Press journalists John Leicester in Paris and Mike Corder in The Hague contributed.

Riot police face high school students as they gather before a demonstration against under-resourced schools in Paris, Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard)

Riot police face high school students as they gather before a demonstration against under-resourced schools in Paris, Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard)

Riot police face high school students as they gather before a demonstration against under-resourced schools in Paris, Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard)

Students gather on the street before a demonstration against under-resourced schools, in Paris, Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard)

Students hold a banner reading "Youth in anger" as they gather before a demonstration against under-resourced schools, in Paris, Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard)

Students gather on the street before a demonstration against under-resourced schools, in Paris, Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard)

BELGRADE, Serbia (AP) — Ahead of a key parliamentary election later this month, Serbia 's election commission has tied overseas voting hours to the local time in the country and approved a contested list of polling stations abroad — a move critics say could make it tough for the Serbian diaspora on the other side of the world to vote.

The decision means that voters in Chicago, which is home to a large Serbian community, would have to cast their ballots between 1 a.m. and 2 p.m., and Serbs in parts of Australia and New Zealand would have to show up at the polls — typically set up in diplomatic missions and offices — and vote overnight.

The high-stakes Oct. 25 election was called by Serbian populist leader Aleksandar Vucic before he stepped down as president last month in a bid to return to power as prime minister and leader of his Serbian Progressive Party.

Vucic resigned as president on Sept. 27, cutting short his second and final legally allowed term by more than seven months.

The resignation came as he has faced sustained pressure from nearly two years of protests by a burgeoning student movement that has morphed into a political force that will challenge him in the election.

Analysts have predicted a tight race and a high turnout, which could benefit the student-led ticket. However, tensions have been high in Serbia, with incidents and altercations at campaign events. International observers say past elections in the Balkan country have been marred by irregularities and violence.

Serbia's election commission on Monday tied voting hours abroad to the 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. voting window in Serbia — rather than to the time in countries abroad — and approved having 93 polling stations overseas.

And while the number of polling stations is 12 more than in the 2023 election, nine of them are in neighboring Bosnia, which has a large ethnic Serb minority in the Bosnian Serb-dominated entity of Republika Srpska. Bosnia will have a total of 28 polling stations — nearly 30% of the overseas stations.

Vucic is popular among Bosnian Serbs, and his political ally there, Milorad Dodik, has advocated for separating Republika Srpska from Bosnia.

Election officials have said that at least 100,000 citizens have applied to vote abroad, nearly three times as many as in 2023.

Sofija Mandic, a legal expert and member of the election commission, said the overseas voting changes ignored requests from Vucic's opposition for more polling stations in North America, Australia, and Europe.

“This could effectively close the door for more than 26,000 people,” she told independent N1 television on Sunday, ahead of the election commission's vote on the proposed changes.

Mandic said the foreign ministry was handpicking where to establish some polling stations “based on assumptions of how people are going to vote.”

Serbian Foreign Minister Marko Djuric denied that, saying on X on Sunday that the overseas voting changes were guided “not only by the number of registered voters, but also by logistical, security, spatial, (and) staffing” criteria.

Particularly impacted are places like Vancouver in Canada, where nearly 1,300 people have applied to vote but no polling station has been assigned, said David Krstic, another election commission member.

Serb voters who want to cast ballots would have to travel about 3,500 kilometers (2,175 miles) to reach the nearest polling stations in Toronto or Ottawa, he said.

The student protests were initially sparked by a Nov. 1, 2024 train station canopy collapse that killed 16 people in Novi Sad, Serbia’s second-largest city. The student-led movement’s struggle for justice over the tragedy and against corruption grew over time into a political force.

Its electoral arm, the Student List, will challenge the government of Vucic’s party, in power for 14 years. Vucic himself has been either prime minister or president for the past 12 years.

FILE - Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic waves a Serbian flag during a rally of the ruling Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) in Belgrade, Serbia, on June 27, 2026. (AP Photo/Darko Vojinovic, File)