Why did farmers enter Modi’s friend’s country with rumbling tractors? Even the President was surprised

Farmers drove tractors through central Paris to put new pressure on President Emmanuel Macron. Had promised farmers a meeting to discuss their grievances, but then canceled the event. French farmers have been part of a Europe-wide movement to protest against environmental regulations and competition from cheap imports from outside the EU and against lower incomes. They demanded a response from the government by the time the popular national agricultural fair, the Salon de l’Agriculture, opens in Paris on Saturday.

Damien Graffin, grain farmer and head of the Paris region of the main farmers’ union FNSEA, said: The idea was to apply a little pressure before the fair opened. Farmers staged nationwide protests last month until the government promised reforms. But Prime Minister Gabriel Atal failed to placate protesters with new measures announced on Wednesday, and now all eyes are on Macron, who is due to visit an annual agricultural fair on Saturday. Macron said he would organize a debate involving all actors in the agricultural world to outline the future of the sector.

But the initiative got off to a bad start when Macron included the radical eco-group Soulévements de la Terre-Rebellion, which the interior minister recently tried to ban as eco-terrorist. After protests from farming unions, opposition politicians and even within the government, the Soulévements group was not invited, with Macron’s office saying an error had been made.