Pupils put up barricades after migrants expelled

Police sprayed tear gas at a few students throwing missiles but most marched peacefully, some climbing on bus shelters to shout demands for the interior minister’s resignation.

Anger erupted this week over the treatment of a 15-year-old Kosovar girl detained in front of classmates on a field trip. The government says her eight-member family had been denied asylum and was no longer allowed to stay in France.

Such expulsions occur regularly in France as the government tries to limit illegal immigration. But the treatment of the girl touched a nerve, with critics saying police went too far, betraying France’s image as a champion of human rights.

The students say the expulsions are unfair to children and hope to pressure France’s Socialist-led government to allow the girl and a recently-expelled Armenian boy to return to France.

At one Paris secondary school, students piled rubbish bins in front of the entrance beside a banner saying “education in danger.”