BRUSSELS, 26 Feb: Farmers clashed with police in Belgium on Monday, spraying officers with liquid manure and setting fire to piles of tires in a fresh show of force as European Union agriculture ministers met in search of ways to address their concerns.
\nBrussels police said that 900 tractors had entered the city, many bearing down on the European Council building where the ministers were meeting. Smoke drifted through the air near where police in riot gear used water cannons to defend the EU\u2019s headquarters from behind concrete barriers and barbed wire.
\nThe farmers are angry at red tape and competition from cheap imports from countries where the EU\u2019s relatively high standards do not have to be met. They lined up scores of tractors down main roads leading to the city\u2019s European quarter, snarling traffic and blocking public transport.
\nA few tractors forced their way through one barrier, sending officers scurrying.
\nSome are lamenting what they see as the slow death of working the land. \u201cAgriculture. As a child you dream of it, as an adult you die of it,\u201d said one.
\nAt the start of the month, a similar demonstration turned violent as farmers torched hay bales and threw eggs and firecrackers at police near a summit of EU leaders.
\n\u201cWe are getting ignored,\u201d Marieke Van De Vivere, a farmer from the Ghent region in northern Belgium, told The Associated Press.
\nShe invited the ministers \u201cto be reasonable to us, to come with us on a day to work on the field, or with the horses or with the animals, to see that it is not very easy \u2026 because of the rules they put on us.\u201d
\nThe protests are the latest in a series of rallies and demonstrations by farmers across Europe.
\nOn Saturday, French President Emmanuel Macron was greeted with boos and whistles at the opening of the Paris Agricultural Fair by farmers who claim that he\u2019s not doing enough to support them. Spain, the Netherlands and Bulgaria have been hit by protests in recent weeks.
\nThe movement has gathered pace as political parties campaign for Europe-wide elections on June 6-9. It\u2019s already had results. Earlier this month, the EU\u2019s executive branch shelved an anti-pesticide proposal in a concession to the farmers, which make up an important voting constituency.
\nOn the other side of the barriers in Brussels, the ministers were keen to show they\u2019re listening.
\nThe EU presidency, currently held by Belgium, acknowledged that the farmers\u2019 concerns include the burden of respecting environmental policies, a drop in assistance from the bloc\u2019s agricultural subsidy system and the impact of Russia\u2019s attacks on Ukraine\u2019s grain supplies.
\n\u201cWe hear, clearly, their complaints,\u201d said David Clarinval, Belgium\u2019s agriculture minister. Still, he urged them to refrain from violence. \u201cWe can understand that some are in difficult circumstances, but aggression has never been a source for solutions.\u201d
\nFrench Agriculture Minister Marc Fesneau told the few reporters who were permitted by police to enter the building that \u201cthere\u2019s a need to send signals immediately to tell farmers that something is changing, not only in the short-term, but also in the medium and long-term.\u201d (AP)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
BRUSSELS, 26 Feb: Farmers clashed with police in Belgium on Monday, spraying officers with liquid manure and setting fire to piles of tires in a fresh show of force as European Union agriculture ministers met in search of ways to address their concerns. Brussels police said that 900 tractors had entered the city, many bearing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-235620","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235620","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235620"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235620\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235620"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235620"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235620"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}