Demonstration bans trigger court challenges and union criticism
French authorities will deploy about 70,000 police around the country on Saturday as the government seeks to prevent more civil unrest after some of the worst street violence in years erupted on the fringes of cost-of-living protests last weekend. On Friday, Nuñez said the operation would include 10,000 additional officers and elite units usually used for counter-terrorism operations and hostage rescues.
Besides the additional officers, the operation would include water cannon, armoured vehicles, mounted police, helicopters and drones. Nuñez told reporters on Friday after a meeting of senior ministers and officials chaired by President Emmanuel Macron: “We are not talking about a peaceful, friendly demonstration.” He added: “We are ready tomorrow to be extremely firm and not tolerate anything.” Nuñez also said: “We will be uncompromising with rioters, looters and all who commit violence.”
The Marianne statue wears a yellow vest in the Place de la République in Paris after riots at the weekend. Photograph: Abdul Saboor/Reuters.
Demonstrations were expected across France on Saturday, although several cities had banned demonstrations or forced organizers to change their planned routes to protect shops and public buildings. Forecast heavy rain and high winds could dampen turnout. The centres of Lyon and some other large cities would be off-limits to protesters, while Paris had authorized a union march along a limited route in the capital’s east between the Places de la Bastille and Nation that would avoid the city centre.
Paris authorities refused requests for rallies organized by UNEF, France’s main student union, and the gilets jaunes movement. The gilets jaunes’ nationwide protests rocked France in 2018, and the movement planned 600 small-scale events around the country on Saturday. UNEF said its rallies, which grew from high-school protests last month against teacher shortages and dilapidated facilities, would go ahead regardless. Several of the best-known cultural institutions in Paris, including the Louvre, said they would close Saturday.
A demonstrator reads a book on the street at a protest organised by student collectives and trade unions in Paris on 22 October. Photograph: Abdul Saboor/Reuters.
Marseille authorities had banned all protests but said Friday they would allow a union-organized demonstration on an “exceptional basis.” It would be the only authorized protest in the southern Bouches-du-Rhône department.
Unionists and opposition leaders criticized the government for refusing to allow more rallies on Saturday, and the decision was challenged in court in several cities. Marylise Léon, general secretary of the CFDT union federation, accused Macron of an abuse of authority. “It’s counterproductive because there is a lot of anger and a demand to be considered and to be listened to,” Léon told TF1 TV. “It’s not for the president to decide who can legitimately protest.” La France Insoumise, which The Guardian identified as the radical-left party of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, said the government had “crossed the lines that separate a democracy from an authoritarian and police state,” adding that the bans would only “generate more chaos.”
The Guardian reported that largely peaceful demonstrations were hijacked by groups of determined rioters, degenerating into rampant violence and extensive looting in Paris, Marseille, Lyon and other cities. The historic Limoges town hall was set on fire and partly destroyed.
People walk past a closed Monoprix store in Lyon, France, after protests turned violent. Photograph: Lisi Niesner/Reuters.
The Guardian said Macron and his government were struggling to get on top of a crisis that had caught them off guard six months before presidential elections to choose his successor. The government admitted it had “lost control” over the widespread rioting on the previous Saturday.
Justice Minister Gérald Darmanin said 217 people had been jailed since Saturday, half of them first-time offenders. Nuñez was due to visit Trappes on Friday to “inspect the security arrangements,” at the prime minister’s office’s request. A shooting in Trappes, west of Paris, killed one person and injured four others, including a 12-year-old girl; police said the attack could have been racially motivated.
French police attending the aftermath of a shooting in Trappes, near Paris, in which one person was killed and four injured. Photograph: Yoan Valat/EPA.
In the same Friday remarks, Nuñez said social-media calls for violence had come from “ultra-left” groups. On Thursday, Macron called for “the utmost severity” against “acts of delinquency.” Macron said “gangs of rioters” had been mainly responsible for the looting. He also said the worst violence was caused by “ultra-left” groups seeking to “bring down the republic.”
The Guardian described Marine Le Pen as the far-right leader and the frontrunner for next spring’s presidential elections. She was due to host her National Rally (RN) party congress in Orléans, which The Guardian said was expected to draw thousands of supporters and opponents described as leftwing and anti-racist.
The Guardian said demonstrations expected in several other countries this weekend were triggered by a broader, continent-wide wave of discontent over declining public services, housing affordability, public-sector budget cuts and the spiralling cost of living. Protests over related grievances were called for Saturday in Milan, Rome and Turin in Italy; Vienna in Austria; Madrid, Barcelona and other cities in Spain; Lisbon and Porto in Portugal; Dublin in Ireland; and Tirana in Albania.
MSI previously reported that Emmanuel Macron had pledged to prevent a repeat of the weekend violence and that ministers promised a vastly reinforced security operation before planned Saturday marches.