FRANCE-AIRPORT-ENVIRONMENT-NDDL-EVICTION-AGRICULTURE

French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe smiles looking from a window at the Hotel de Matignon on April 25, 2018 in Paris, after a meeting with the Prefect of the Pays de la Loire region about the ZAD (Zone a Defendre - Zone to defend) in the French western city of Notre-Dame-des-Landes, where the project of a new airport was ditched. In January, the government jettisoned plans for an airport that had divided the local community for nearly half a century, and told the protesters to clear off the farmland by spring. But some of the motley group of eco-warriors, anti-capitalists and farmers who had turned the 1,600-hectare (4,000-acre) site into a utopian experiment in autonomous living had demanded the right to stay put. The government said the main aim of the operation was to retake control of a key road that had been blocked for five years and evict around 100 "of the most radical" squatters from a total of around 250. The occupants of the ZAD said on April 23 to wait for a 'gesture of appeasement' from the government, after the presentation of 40 projects on the ZAD as requested by the prefecture. (Photo by Eric FEFERBERG / AFP) (Photo by ERIC FEFERBERG/AFP via Getty Images)