"Farmers rallied outside the European Parliament in Strasbourg on Wednesday against government-backed mass culling of cattle herds in France and a trade agreement between the European Union and South America's Mercosur bloc. Footage shows protesters gathered around a fire, as tractors block roads, some carrying banners with messages including ‘Death is in the meadow’ and ‘Our end is your hunger, don't touch my cow, shitty Mercosur’. President of the National Rally party and European Parliament Member, Jordan Bardella, joined the protesters, pledging to support the ‘fight’ against the EU-Mercosur agreement that would bring ‘disastrous consequences for French agriculture’. “We are fighting inside against a certain number of norms, of nails in the coffin of French agriculture being put today, against a European Commission which we have the feeling that it no longer wants work in France, it no longer wants agriculture, and we are in particular fighting against the Mercosur deal,” he said. Protesters hit out at the likely impact of the deal on French farmers, who they noted are already overburdened by taxes and controls. “The Mercosur deal is criminal. We know that in France, every day, every two days, a farmer commits suicide. Because he is strangled, strangled by the standards, strangled by policies that are decided in offices. And we sign treaties that will completely suffocate them,” protester Marie Andre said. Protesters also hit out over the mass culling of cattle after outbreaks of Lumpy Skin Disease, dubbed 'cow COVID'. As of December 14, France had recorded 113 outbreaks of 'cow COVID' cases this year, leading to the culling of around 3,300 cattle - about 0.02 per cent of the national herd, the Agriculture Ministry said.  “We <...> bring attention to a lot of things that do not work in the agricultural environment," said farmer Jeremie Lutringer, urging the government to "stop to the total slaughter of cows in France, because we realised that everything they are doing, the protocol applied, it does not work, quite simply.” On Sunday, the French government formally asked the European Union to delay the signing of the agreement to strengthen protections for European farmers. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is expected to travel to Brazil later this week to advance negotiations, though the deal still requires approval from EU member states. Meanwhile, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has said it is 'now or never' for the deal to be signed, warning that he will not discuss future agreements with the EU if the deal is not finalised on Saturday as scheduled."