Swiss Juso says November youth strike was planned since summer

Juso Switzerland has been planning to join an international youth strike on November 20 since the summer, not in response to protests in France, the Swiss broadcaster SRF reported.

An Instagram post on August 10 called for an international youth strike on November 20. The account behind the post, International Youth Strike, featured logos of several European left-wing youth parties, including Juso Switzerland. Juso president Mirjam Hostetmann confirmed the plans to SRF.

Hostetmann said people from Germany had begun building international links early in the year to create a youth movement against rearmament and austerity. Juso decided to support the movement, she said, adding that activists from groups including climate strikes and school strikes against compulsory military service were well connected internationally.

She said the planned November protest was not related to the French school protests, which began in mid-September and have sometimes turned violent. The French protests concern the country’s failing education system, while the international strike is focused on what Juso describes as growing militarisation in Europe alongside cuts to social security.

Juso vice-president Julien Berthod attended a demonstration in Paris over the weekend and expressed support in a video. Hostetmann said he was in the city primarily for an international meeting about the planned youth strike. Paris was chosen for convenience, she said, and the meeting’s time and place had been set in mid-September.

Young SVP president Nils Fiechter warned SRF that a youth strike in Switzerland could pose a serious threat to internal security. Hostetmann condemned violence at protests in France but said protest culture there was not comparable to Switzerland’s. She said she wanted young people to demonstrate peacefully and argued that they were not heard enough in politics. Organisers are planning actions in Switzerland’s major cities, with protests in France and Italy drawing short-term attention to the call.