German soldiers march down the Champs-Elysees during the Bastille Day parade in Paris on Sunday.The Associated Press
France’s annual Bastille Day parade became a showcase for defence co-operation in Europe as leaders of other European nations joined President Emmanuel Macron on Sunday to review their military contingents marching on the Champs-Elysees.
Flags of the 10 countries participating in the European Intervention Initiative, a French-led joint military pact created at Macron’s initiative, led off the military parade in Paris that featured more than 4,000 military personnel, 69 military airplanes and 39 helicopters.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the invitation to celebrate France’s national holiday “is a symbol for an intensified European co-operation” and “a big gesture toward European defence policy.”
At France’s 2017 Bastille Day events, guest of honour U.S. President Donald Trump was so impressed by the spectacle he ordered a military parade in Washington for the United States’ July 4 celebrations.
But the biggest crowd-pleaser this year was the man who rocketed through the air on a flying hoverboard. The inventor, former jet-skiing champion Franky Zapata, held a rifle as he zoomed over the parade route.
Tensions in the street remained high following months of demonstrations by the anti-Macron yellow vest protesters who want more help for French workers.
Several hundred yellow vest activists — without their trademark fluorescent emergency jackets — gathered on the margins of the parade and were involved in standoffs with police.
Television images showed police grabbing one of the movement’s leaders, Eric Drouet, as he stood peacefully on the sidelines and escorting him away.
Mr. Macron hosted a lunch at the presidential Elysee Palace with the other European leaders.
Later Sunday, French police fired tear gas to disperse protesters on the Champs-Elysees.
The famous boulevard was reopened to traffic as soon as the parade finished, but a few hundred protesters from the grassroots ‘yellow vests’ movement tried to occupy it.
Police fired tear gas to disperse the protesters, some hooded, who were trying to block the road with metal barricades, dustbins and other debris.
Several loud bangs were heard. Protesters hurled objects at the police, booed and set bins on fire. Police drove some of the demonstrators to adjacent streets where they regrouped and set up new barricades, drawing more tear gas fire.
A video obtained by Reuters showed a man kicking a policeman to the ground from behind and punching him after the policeman had used pepper spray to push back a couple. The policeman and his colleagues fought back with truncheons.
The police prefecture said on Twitter it had ordered the protesters to leave the area, or be forcibly removed.
Paris Police Chief Didier Lallement told journalists during a Sunday evening patrol of the boulevard that order had been restored. He said some 200 rioters had tried to occupy the Champs Elysees but had been pushed out.