Guerrillas of the royalist Cần Vương movement massacred around a third of Vietnam's Christian population during the colonial period as part of their rebellion against French rule. They were defeated in the 1890s after a decade of resistance by the Catholics in reprisal for their earlier massacres. Another large-scale rebellion, the Thái Nguyên uprising, was also suppressed heavily. The French developed a plantation economy to promote the export of tobacco, indigo, tea and coffee. However, they largely ignored the increasing demands for civil rights and self-government.