Paris: French butchers have issued a plea for police protection against vegans, whom they blame for a series of attacks designed to "spread terror" among meat-lovers.

The butchers say they are coming under "physical, verbal and moral" attack from vegans and animal rights groups, and warn that animosity against their profession is being fuelled by heavy media exposure to the anti-meat cause.

Then French presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron, left, shakes hands with a butcher as he visits the meat pavillion at the Rungis wholesale food market, south of Paris, in May 2017. Credit:AP

They are asking for Gérard Collomb, the interior minister, to intervene.

Their request comes days after a rotisserie in Lille, northern France, was vandalised, the fourth such incident of its kind in a matter of weeks.