Authorities in Lyon said between 200 and 300 shops in the city centre were ransacked and looted last weekend and the tourist office was set ablaze. Lyon, France’s third-biggest city, has banned all protests in the centre on Saturday.
In Limoges, two people were arrested after the town hall was set on fire. Justice minister Gérald Darmanin said 174 of the 2,500 people arrested since last weekend’s rioting had been remanded in custody and more than 900 were being prosecuted.
President Emmanuel Macron said the measures were necessary to protect city centres, businesses and public buildings, and that the general recommendation was that there should be no demonstrations in the coming days. He blamed much of the unrest and looting on rioters who came to loot, and said the worst of the violence was due to political and seditious acts by ultra-far-left groups who aimed to bring down the republic. He said the priority was a return to calm and that he would chair a defence council of key ministers on Friday to decide concrete next steps for nationwide demonstrations called for Saturday and afterwards.
Marseille, Nice and Toulon announced similar bans for Saturday. In Paris, a march planned for Saturday in the east of the capital, starting at the Place de la Bastille, was authorised but banned from the city centre. A separate Saturday march by students and some members of the gilets jaunes movement was not permitted. An initial police ban on a student protest planned in Paris for Thursday was overturned by a court, while marches scheduled that day in Grenoble, Rouen, Le Havre and Toulon were halted.
The response has included partial night-time curfews in parts of several cities, including Paris, and bans on gatherings around the Élysée presidential palace, parliament and the capital’s main train stations. Businesses in central Paris and other cities had begun boarding up windows and hiring private security, French media reported. The demonstrations began last month at a high school in Créteil, south-east of Paris, over staff shortages and dilapidated buildings, then spread and widened into protests over living costs.