208 rioters held amid clashes ahead of UN summit in Paris

France’s interior minister said that 208 people were detained after clashes with riot police on the eve of the start of a critical climate conference, and that 174 of them were being held for possible charges.

French President Francois Hollande said the violence on Sunday was “scandalous” both because the clashes were caused by “disruptive elements” that have nothing to do with environmental defenders and because the Place de la Republique has been a memorial square for the 130 victims of the November 13 Paris attacks.

Police used tear gas to stop the advance of groups of several hundred people throwing projectiles that included memorial candles, police said.

“These individuals have no place and that’s why everything will be done to move them aside,” Hollande said from Brussels.

Hundreds of thousands of people rallied around the world Sunday on the eve of the Paris summit aimed at averting catastrophic climate change, but violent clashes in the French capital soured the show of people power.

The global protests, including an emotional linking of hands near the heart of this month’s terror attacks in Paris, were aimed at building grassroots pressure for a historic deal at the UN talks to limit global warming.

As US President Barack Obama and other world leaders began flying into Paris for Monday’s official opening, negotiators vowed at a preliminary session to honor the victims of the attacks by forging an ambitious deal.

“The best way to honor the memory of those who have fallen, those who are victims of barbaric attacks, is to carry out what we have committed to,” the co-chair of the talks, Ahmed Djoghlaf, told participants at a vast conference center in Le Bourget, on the northern outskirts of Paris.

Deep emotions and tensions from the November 13 attacks, in which Islamist militants killed 130 people in a series of gun and suicide bomb assaults, were evident across the City of Lights on Sunday.

French authorities canceled two climate demonstrations because of security fears.

But in a show of defiance against the militants and determination to have their voices heard on climate change, thousands of people in Paris gathered to hold hands and link up in a two-kilometer (1.2-mile) human chain.

“Hear our voices! We are here!” they chanted.

Protesters left a 100-meter (300-foot) gap in the human chain outside the Bataclan concert hall, the site where gunmen killed 90 people, as a mark of respect to the victims.

Instead of marching, activists placed thousands of pairs of shoes — weighing more than four tons according to organizers — on Place de la Republique square.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon left a pair of running shoes, and Pope Francis sent shoes to be placed on his behalf.

But a band of anti-capitalist militants infiltrated the protests, leading to clashes with riot police in the late afternoon and the detention of more than 200 people.

Police fired teargas at protesters, who pelted them with bottles and candles in Place de la Republique and chanted: “State of emergency, police state,” referring to the post-attack protest restrictions.