Der Standard says 5,000 arrests and Brussels Signal says thousands, while the French papers give the minister's 400 to 500 schools shut and no arrest figure

The school count is one man's count. Libération, Le Figaro and De Telegraaf all say 400 to 500 lycées will be fully or partly shut on Monday. All three credit the figure to Education Minister Edouard Geffray or his ministry. No report we hold counted the schools itself.

The arrest count has no source at all. Der Standard's headline gives 5,000 arrests. Brussels Signal says "thousands". Neither says who counted. None of the French reports we hold gives an arrest figure.

Three answers on blame. Der Standard writes that Macron "hat die Lage nicht mehr im Griff". Deník N reports that the government blames the far left, and gives students' fear of unequal schooling. Le Figaro leads with Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez: "Les forces de l'ordre ne répriment pas la jeunesse".

What is not settled. Who counted the arrests. Who estimated Brussels Signal's damage "at millions". Whether the police went too far: the magistrates' union says so, Nuñez says no, and nobody else we hold weighs in. No student protester is quoted in the text we hold.

What this is about. Secondary-school students in France have spent more than a week blocking their schools. Some of the protests have turned violent, and on Sunday the government said hundreds of schools would stay shut on Monday.

How it got here. In France the lycée is the last three years of school, roughly ages 15 to 18. Lycéens have a long habit of protest: they block the gates with bins and barriers to stop classes going ahead. Le Figaro calls it a blocus and Libération a blocage. Students have done this in past fights over pensions and education reform. According to Deník N, this wave began in the Paris suburbs and spread across the country. It turned into clashes with police. Brussels Signal said on 2 October that the blockades were entering their second week.

The politics around it are weak. Emmanuel Macron has been president since 2017 and was re-elected in 2022. The snap parliamentary election he called in 2024 left the National Assembly with no majority, and governments since then have struggled to survive. Der Standard reads the protests through that weakness. That is the paper's own reading, not an established cause.

Who is involved. - Edouard Geffray, the education minister, decides which schools are safe to reopen. - Laurent Nuñez, the interior minister, is in charge of the police. - The Syndicat de la magistrature, a union of judges and prosecutors, has accused the police of going too far, Le Figaro reports. - The teaching unions, together with school-student and university-student unions, have called a national day of action for Tuesday. - The students themselves. Deník N reports that many feel they do not get equal access to education and fear for their future.

What is at stake. Whether hundreds of schools can reopen, and whether a school protest turns into a wider fight over education and over how the police handle teenagers.

Where it stands. On Sunday 4 October the minister said 400 to 500 schools would be shut or partly shut on Monday. The strike follows on Tuesday.