Rioters turn to airports after fuel depots are re-opened

Workers opposed to a higher retirement age blocked roads to airports around France yesterday, leaving passengers in Paris dragging suitcases on foot along an emergency breakdown lane.

• French riot police took up position on the streets of Nanterre as young people once again took to the streets to protest the rise in retirement age Picture: Getty

Outside the capital, hooded youths smashed store windows amid clouds of tear gas.

Riot police in black body armour forced striking workers away from blocked fuel depots in western France, restoring petrol. Officers in the Paris suburb of Nanterre and the southeastern city of Lyon sprayed tear gas but appeared unable to stop the violence.

After months of largely peaceful disruptions, some protests erupted into scattered violence this week over the government's push to raise the retirement age from 60 to 62. President Nicolas Sarkozy vowed that his conservative party would pass the reform in a Senate vote expected today.

Many workers feel the change would be a first step in eroding France's social benefits - which include long holidays, contracts that make it hard for employers to lay off workers and a state-subsidized health care system - in favor of "American-style capitalism".

Mr Sarkozy ordered all fuel depots forcibly reopened and vowed yesterday that he would "carry the retirement reform through to the end". Protesters waving red union flags and reflective vests temporarily blocked the main road leading to one of two terminals at Orly Airport yesterday.

The ADP airport authority warned of "serious difficulties expected in access to airports and air traffic."

The protests tangled traffic to the airport and some passengers walked hundreds of yards along an emergency lane to get there, dragging suitcases behind them. In one terminal, screens showed that 10 of 52 flights yesterday afternoon were cancelled.

"It's Baghdad here," said Lionel Philippe, who arrived at Orly after much difficulty because of protesters blocking access to the airport - only to find his flight to Biarritz cancelled.

At Charles de Gaulle airport north of Paris, the nation's biggest, protesters sang the French national anthem before pushing through a police barricade.

The CGT Transport union sioad protests also shut down the Clermont-Ferrand airport in the south and disrupted airports in Nice and Nantes.

With nearly a third of France's petrol stations dry, authorities stepped in to force open three fuel depots blocked by striking workers for days, Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux said.

At one site in the western town of Donges, police formed a corridor along the road leading to the depot to allow trucks to pass in and out.

Mr Hortefeux warned: "We will use all means necessary to get these delinquents," adding this included the GIGN paramilitary police.The police deployed so far have been CRS riot police, helmeted and wielding shields, sometimes firing tear gas or rubber bullets.

There are still more than 3,000 gas stations empty of fuel, or about a quarter of those nationwide, the environment minister said.

In Nanterre yesterday, about 100 students blocked the school entrance and part of highway in front of the school.