A 20-year-old man was seriously injured in the hand during clashes with police at the end of Saturday’s demonstration in Toulouse, the prefecture said. The injured protester was evacuated by firefighters after incidents in the Arènes district, west of the city centre.
The Haute-Garonne prefecture said that, as a gathering was being dispersed, emergency services took charge of a person with a serious hand injury, and later specified that he was a 20-year-old man. It said the circumstances of the injury were not known at this stage and that investigations would be carried out under the judicial authority to clarify what happened.
A street medic who treated the injured man and asked to remain anonymous said he had a severe injury to his right hand, with several fingers torn off, linked to a device exploding nearby. At the end of the procession, protesters carrying stones or bottles confronted police, who used dispersal grenades and tear gas in the Arènes district.
Saturday’s march in Toulouse drew 26,500 people according to the prefecture and 80,000 according to the CGT. The procession set off calmly at 2 p.m. on a loop through western Toulouse, avoiding the city centre, where shops had been damaged the previous Saturday.
As in other large cities, security was reinforced to prevent further violence, with gendarmerie reinforcements supported by Centaure vehicles, the RAID and Sentinelle soldiers. Police carried out many preventive checks from the morning, including of people arriving at Matabiau station, near the starting point. Anyone wanting to reach Place du Capitole, protected by barriers and large numbers of police and CRS officers, had to have their bags checked.
A curfew has been in force since Thursday evening, and remains in place for the coming night, in central Toulouse from midnight to 5 a.m.