French protesters take to the streets for a second time in a month

A new round of protests against President Nicolas Sarkozy's plan to reform the country's pension system hit France Thursday (23 September), with both the government and unions declaring victory regarding turn-out.

While police figures put the number of people marching in the more than 230 protests at 997,000 nationwide, down from 1.1 million two weeks ago, unions organising the protests said 3 million people took part, up from 2.7 million. The national railway, SNCF, said 37.1 percent...