FRENCH POLICE THREATEN TO JOIN THE YELLOW VEST PROTESTS - RIOT COPS FEELING THE STRAIN

Not doing this for free.

Nobody has suffered more from the Yellow Vest protests that have been rocking France than the French police themselves. Since the demonstrations and riots began several weeks ago, they have been working overtime to contain the chaos and bearing the brunt of the public's anger. 

But now it looks like they have reached breaking point, as the three main police unions have now threatened to join the protests in order to force the government to pay overtime and reverse cuts to the police budget.

As reported by Newsweek:

On Wednesday, French officials met with police trade union leaders to work out a deal to soothe anger in law enforcement ranks regarding overwork, unpaid overtime and difficult working conditions, Le Monde reported.

But some activists are calling on police to walk out on government negotiations, close down police stations and join the “gilets jaunes”—or yellow vest—protesters with whom they have been facing off since November 17.

Negotiations between three unions—Alliance, UNSA-Police and Unity-SGP-FO—and Interior Minister Christophe Castaner on Tuesday failed to reach a settlement. As talks resumed on Wednesday, France 24 reported that activists were calling on forces across the country to commit to a “slowdown” and only respond to emergencies until the dispute had been settled.

Police have accumulated some 23 million hours of overtime that is yet to be paid. According to The Local France, police union leader Frédéric Lagache explained, “Faced with this irresponsibility [of the government], we are forced to be irresponsible in our actions.”

Two of the unions have called for Yellow-Vest-style demonstrations by police officers on Wednesday (Dec 26th), referring to "Act 1," "Act II" and "Act III," the same language used by the Yellow Vest demonstrators to refer to their protests.

In addition to unpaid overtime, the police unions are also opposed to cuts to the national police budget of around $70.8 million.

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