France counts 161,500 student protesters as the police watchdog takes up 36 cases

France's school protest movement is now measuring itself on two ledgers at once: the crowds in the streets, and the injury files building up on both sides.

The Interior Ministry counted 161,500 demonstrators across the country on Tuesday, with 41,500 in Paris alone, while organizers put the turnout at 480,000. The movement began on September 17 with a walkout at a high school in the Paris suburb of Creteil and has grown into nationwide marches and blockades over teacher shortages, overcrowded classrooms, long school days and buildings in poor repair. The high school union says more than 1,800 institutions have been affected. Swedish activist Greta Thunberg joined students in Saint Denis, outside Paris, and told reporters that young people are not being included in the conversation and that their future is being robbed. In Nantes, thousands marched behind a banner reading: schools without money, a country without a future.

The second ledger is the police response. Interior Minister Laurent Nunez told the Senate Law Committee on Tuesday that 36 cases have been referred to the Inspectorate General of the National Police, the police watchdog. Four involve injuries described as mutilating, six more involve significant injuries, and the rest concern allegations of physical violence, insults and sexual assault. Nunez said the use of one type of launcher fired stun grenade has been suspended after an incident in Lens on October 5 in which a 15 year old pupil lost a hand. Another student lost the use of an eye, allegedly to a rubber bullet. The minister defended the police, drawing a line between peaceful demonstrations, which he said officers do not intervene against, and violence or property damage. The referrals do not establish wrongdoing by any officer.

The wider numbers frame the pressure. The justice ministry says more than 6,800 people, largely minors, have been taken into police custody over the course of the protests, and the education ministry counts 147 staff injured since the movement began, as of Tuesday. A finance ministry report released this week found that 32 percent of the education ministry's budget goes to pensions for retired civil servants rather than to schools, a figure that has become part of the argument in the streets. The government hopes the coming two week school holiday drains the movement. The students organizing the blockades say it will not, and the school students union is due to meet the education minister on Thursday.