PARIS: A theatre director rammed a car into the rear gate of the French presidential palace yesterday in protest over cuts in government funding for the arts, police and state officials said.
The 67-year-old Italian national was arrested as he attempted to force his way through the late-nineteenth-century Grille du Coq, or Rooster Gate, which leads into the gardens of the Elysee palace from Gabriel Avenue, near the Champs-Elysees, the officials said.
He was protesting against cuts in subsidies to his small Parisian theatre, the Italian Comedy, a police source said, adding that the man was being held in custody at a Parisian hospital. President Francois Hollande has cut into France’s traditionally generous culture budget. REUTERS
