HUNDREDS of thousands of people marched against the far right in Paris and other French cities at the weekend.

Trade unionists and supporters of the quickly assembled Popular Front — an alliance of left forces announced on Friday to contest snap elections called by President Emmanuel Macron — chanted “Liberty for all, equality for all, fraternity for all” in a variant of France’s famous revolutionary motto.

Police estimated 250,000 marchers through a rain-swept Paris on Saturday and deployed more than 20,000 officers to watch them. Thousands marched in dozens of other locations, with placards denouncing not just Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally — which leads in polls for the first round of parliamentary elections — but Mr Macron’s anti-refugee legislation. Cries of “Free Palestine” echoed through the streets.