Overview
- Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez said about 70,000 police and gendarmes will be mobilised for Saturday’s protests and that authorities will take a firm approach to arrests and prosecutions.
- Major Paris institutions including the Louvre, Orsay, Picasso Museum and the Grand Palais closed for the weekend and Art Basel cut its program as organisers cited safety concerns.
- Last weekend’s demonstrations escalated into fires, looting, smashed shopfronts and attacks on public buildings, leaving hundreds of arrests and widespread property damage.
- Courts have already sent 217 people to prison for riot‑related crimes and local prefectures have banned or rerouted marches in several cities to protect city centres.
- The unrest began in high schools over teacher shortages and dilapidated buildings and has broadened into wider cost‑of‑living anger that is reshaping public opinion ahead of next year’s presidential vote.