The French government acknowledged a failure of law enforcement as recent cost-of-living protests spiraled into violence and looting, unveiling measures to tighten security and support shops that were damaged.
Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said on France Inter radio that intelligence services had failed to anticipate the size and the violence of the protests, Bloomberg reported on the 19th. Authorities had initially expected fewer than 200,000 people, but 550,000 turned out, he said. "The measures we took were out of proportion, not only to the number of participants but also to the rioters, looters and far-left activists who drove the march out of control," Nunez said. He said he had offered to resign but that President Emmanuel Macron refused and asked for an accounting of the intelligence failure.
Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu asked local authorities the same day to impose curfews where needed. "These are specific acts of delinquency and looting, and their continuation is out of the question," Lecornu told reporters. He blamed "a far-left movement seeking to create serious disorder in the country all the way to the presidential election." Protests were banned in Marseille that day. Former Prime Minister Gabriel Attal called for regulation of social media.
More than 500,000 people took part in protests across the country on the 17th. What began as peaceful demonstrations over poor conditions in classrooms and hospitals and the burden of living costs soon turned. Interior Ministry figures showed 2,397 people were arrested the previous day.
Macron said in an address the following day that "what the country needs is order and peace, not escalation." He said many of the protesters were concerned about living costs, particularly prices at the pump, and added that he would seek to "secure supply" of fuel during a tour of Gulf states that began that day.
Political exchanges have also sharpened with the presidential election six months away. Marine Le Pen, leader of the far right and the front-runner in opinion polls, said in a speech posted on X, formerly Twitter, that day that "France has been taken hostage, caught between violence and incompetence." Le Pen singled out far-left figure Jean-Luc Melenchon and his France Unbowed party as responsible for inciting the violence.
French assets fell the same day. Government bonds underperformed those of most European countries, with the gap between 10-year yields and German bund yields widening 8 basis points to 145 basis points. One basis point equals 0.01 percentage point. Christophe Laure, head of UMIH Prestige, which represents four- and five-star hotels, said cancellations had begun at luxury hotels in Paris. "Clients were frightened and in shock," he added.
Alexandre Bompard, the Carrefour chief executive who heads France's retail federation, said recovery would cost hundreds of millions of euros. Damage from a similar episode in June 2023 was estimated at 730 million euros ($819 million, or about 1.1 trillion won). Lecornu said part of the country's unemployment support funds would be redirected to shop owners who suffered damage.
Meanwhile, accounts on X linked to the Yellow Vest protests called for action to continue through the week and for further rallies. Some unions have announced a strike for Nov. 5.