News - Middle East: Police in France have scuffled with protesters, on the 12th day of nationwide demonstrations against the government's pension plans. 

Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets across the country on Thursday against President Emmanuel Macron's contested plans, which will raise the retirement age from 62 to 64.
 
The demonstrations came a day before a much-awaited verdict by the Constitutional Council on the legality of the bill. Police halted a protest in front of the council, France’s equivalent of the US supreme court.

Paris police chief Laurent Nunez had warned in advance that protesters might “hit out, often against what they see as capitalist signs”.

The protesters engaged in intense scuffles with police as smoke bombs, projectiles and tear gas were fired, before a group set off red flares outside the court building.

Workers blocked the entrance to the Feyzin refinery near Lyon for two hours before police intervened. Others blockaded a rubbish incinerator outside Paris.

On the Rhine river, cargo traffic was disrupted after workers cut power at a waterway lock near the border with Germany and Switzerland,