France awoke to shattered storefronts and scorched streets today after nationwide marches over the rising cost of living spiralled into clashes with police, widespread looting and arson that officials described as “extreme” violence.
The unrest came after weeks of student protests and with presidential elections to replace President Emmanuel Macron just six months away.
In Paris, whole streets “have been devastated”, the city’s mayor Emmanuel Gregoire said, after groups of masked young men set parked cars ablaze and pillaged shops.
Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu, condemning the “extreme intensity” of the violence, said 1,200 people were arrested and 150 police officers were injured.
“It was a miracle the toll isn’t higher,” he said.
Violence flared on the fringes of marches in the capital and other cities focused on living costs. The interior ministry said 550,000 people attended, while the CGT union, which took part, put the figure at 800,000.
Watch: Protesters set fire to tourism office in Lyon
Police fired tear gas and used water cannon as some protesters hurled projectiles and launched fireworks.
In the southern city of Saint-Etienne, a 17-year-old boy had his right hand blown off by a crowd-control grenade.
As demonstrations moved through city centres – and after many dispersed – gangs of youths roamed streets, at times confronting police, lighting fires and targeting shuttered businesses, breaking in to strip shelves.
Scores of shops were looted in Paris, Marseille, Nice, Nantes, Bordeaux, Limoges, Lille, Toulouse and Strasbourg, including supermarkets, pharmacies, luxury boutiques, clothing retailers, opticians, cosmetic vendors and consumer electronics stores.
In Paris, AFP reporters said groups of about half a dozen young men appeared to work methodically. Wearing masks and gloves, they first disconnected security cameras before smashing windows to get inside.
Protesters hold a banner reading ‘The people will win’ on the roof of a building in Montpellier yesterday
Looting capped a day marked by destruction and vandalism, with several town halls among the targets.
In Limoges, a town hall more than 140 years old was largely destroyed by a fire after masked protesters broke in, the region’s top official said. In Marseille and Lille, two other town halls were breached and vandalised.
A police compound in Bordeaux was also vandalised, while in Lyon protesters set a tourist office on fire.
Mr Macron vowed consequences, saying “those who carried out vandalism, attacked administrative offices or businesses, or carried out looting – even in our town halls, will be prosecuted and punished”.
With campaigning under way ahead of April and May’s presidential elections, opposition figures seeking to replace Mr Macron moved quickly to seize on the turmoil.
Far-right candidate Marine Le Pen denounced “the rioters” and argued that her far-left rival Jean-Luc Melenchon’s party had “legitimised the violence”.
She said she would protect the French “from the violence of the extreme left”.
Mr Melenchon, who had been a prominent supporter of the demonstrations and the student protests that preceded them, urged marchers to stay away from any looting, calling it “contrary to our methods”.
Watch: Police use tear gas to disperse protesters in Paris
Yesterday’s ‘yellow and youth’ demonstrations were called by France’s Yellow Vest movement, which staged major street protests eight years ago against Mr Macron’s government over planned fuel tax increases.
At the heart of the latest mobilisation was the cost-of-living squeeze, driven up in part by the war in the Middle East, which has helped send inflation soaring in Europe and beyond.
“We’re sick of slaving away for poverty wages while our rents keep going up,” teacher Regine Monfroid said in Strasbourg, in eastern France.
But the marches also drew in a wider mix of grievances.
In Paris, tens of thousands moved through the east and north of the city in a major march, with some chanting “Everyone hates the police” and “Macron, resign”.
Several demonstrators invoked the French Revolution of 1789.
“It’s the Revolution – we’re taking the Bastille!” some shouted in Marseille as they pushed into the mayor’s offices.
In La Rochelle, marchers streamed behind a placard declaring: “Revolution or death.”
And in Montpellier, a huge blue banner reading “The people will win” was unfurled above a central square.
“The government is trembling and it’s right to tremble because when the French people are angry, they never let up,” Ryad Rani, head of the LSU secondary school student representative body, told journalists in Paris.
