The GB News reporter was on the frontline as protestors clashed with riot police.
GB News reporter Doug Beattie was caught up in the French riots as he reported for the channel (Image: GB News)
GB News reporter Dougie Beattie was caught up in the French riots and forced to dodge incoming tear gas grenades as he admitted they were “choking” him and his cameraman while they reported from the frontline. Far-left rioters in France clashed with police on the streets of Paris as interior Minister Laurent Nuñez said nearly 1,000 arrests had been made across the country, adding that the figure was expected to rise further. Beattie was on site with riot police beside him as he braodcast the gravity of the situation back to the studio. Wearing protective goggles as he spoke to camera he said: “This is really getting to the front line of stuff now. So far there have been many, many arrests here,” he said.
He continued speaking as the officers applied gas masks and launched another tear gas canister towards the violent protestors: “Many people have been taken out injured.
“This is going to get quite violent in the next few hours here. There are fireworks, bricks and bottles now coming in at the police on their line.”
He was briefly discombobulated as rioters fled in all directions banging into him and his cameraman who continued broadcasting.
Tear gas wafted behind him in a fog like effect as he admitted: “I can tell you the air is absolutely thick. This is really choking us and getting in our eyes
“We will be leaving this area very, very shortly,” he conceded.
GB News reporter Dougie Beattie was surrounded by tear gas as he reported on the French riots (Image: GB News)
The French interior ministry estimates 410,000 people took part in nationwide demonstrations. Around 110,000 of the protesters were in Paris, the ministry added.
Police fired tear gas in cities including Lyon and Marseille. Some of France’s tourist attractions and metro stations closed before the protests.
In Grenoble, southeastern France, hundreds of masked individuals carried out acts of vandalism and attacked police “with mortars and projectiles”, according to officials.
Other parts of Europe also witnessed scenes of widespread devastation. In Brussels, police deployed tear gas and pepper spray as clashes broke out with anti-government protesters demanding improved conditions in the education sector.
Meanwhile a key lieutenant of Kemi Badenoch, Helen Whately has told Prime Minister Andy Burnham the turmoil in France is a warning to Britain that we ignore the “youth jobs crisis” in this country at our peril.
The Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary, who is fighting for an “emergency package” to get young people who are in danger of a life on benefits into the workforce fears Andy Burnham will not embrace welfare reform because he does not want to anger Labour backbenchers and bring his honeymoon crashing to an end. But she points at the unrest across the Channel as proof that Britain must not allow a social disaster to deepen.
“Looking over at France and those riots, if you have hundreds of thousands of young people who are losing hope, they’re going to get angry,” she said.
“We don’t want that to happen. We’ve got to make sure that young people have hope, and can see that we’re a country that’s got a Government that’s on their side.”