Originally published in the Guardian on 7 May 1968
PARIS, MAY 6
Paris, venue later this week for the opening of the Vietnam peace talks, was stunned tonight after a day and a night of riots by at least 10,000 students on a scale unequalled in post-war years. St Germain des Pres, the capital's literary and cultural centre, resembled a battlefield after several hours of fierce clashes between students – supported in some cases by university teachers – and the police.
The Place St Germain des Pres and the Rue de Rennes running from the Place to Montparnasse station was an appalling sight late tonight.
Buses with their tyres slashed and windows broken were slewn across the street. Cars upended with windows smashed marked the spots where the hard core of the students put up fierce resistance to the police who, with nerves shattered after a full day of rioting, clubbed the demonstrators when they caught them and sometimes bystanders with a sickening ferocity.
Red Cross workers with helmets ran through exploding teargas grenades to give first aid treatment to the hundreds of casualties. As the police slowly drove the demonstrators up the Rue de Rennes, Red Cross workers carried youths and girls, with heads streaming with blood.
Policemen and journalists with long years of experience of Paris riots almost disbelieved the evidence of their eyes as they viewed the scene of destruction. The roadway was torn up in numerous places where students had armed themselves with stones and pieces of tarmacadam. Shop windows were shattered and the blue pall of teargas hung over the strangely silent Place St Germain, usually the gayest of night spots but tonight like a quarter in mourning.
From early this morning the Sorbonne, which has been closed until further order by the Rector, was ringed by one of the largest forces of police ever to have been called to deal with the capital's turbulent students.
The National Union of French Students (UNEF) and the University Teachers' Syndicate both called for an unlimited nation-wide strike to protest against "police repression," and to obtain the release of the students imprisoned after last Friday's disturbances in the Latin Quarter, when more than five hundred were arrested.
Joseph Carroll
These archive extracts are compiled by members of the Guardian's research and information department. Email: research.department@guardian.co.uk