Protesting French farmers block border and force major road closures 

A new protest by French farmers blocked the France-Spain border again on Thursday and forced traffic to be diverted from the AP-7, one of Catalonia's major highways. 

Some twenty kilometers of the motoroway northbound are closed to traffic, with police diverting vehicles near the northern city of Figueres, as happened last week during a similar protest. 

Farmers unions gathered at a motorway tollbooth in Perpignan to begin a slow drive in around 100 tractors to Le Boulou, where they blocked the A9 highway in France, which continues as the AP-7 south of the border. 

Further inland from the AP-7, French farmers blocked another border crossing with tractors at the Ares pass, forcing the C-38 to be closed. 

Farmers unfurled a banner in Catalan – spoken on both sides of the France-Spain border – saying: 'Without the Vallespir farmers, there is no future.'   

Across Europe, farmers are protesting against the increase in costs and the measures that the sector must comply with in order to receive subsidies from the EU via the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). 

In recent weeks there have been protests in France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and Italy, among others, and Catalan farmers have organized demonstrations for next week and the following one.