Europe Erupts Again: France Makes 1,000 Arrests as Soldiers Guard Milan Against Rioters

For the second Saturday in a row, mass protests over living costs, schools and government spending turned into street fights across Europe. France made nearly 1,000 arrests, Italy sent soldiers into the center of Milan, and riot police fired tear gas in Rome, Turin, Brussels and Albania's capital, Tirana.

France's Interior Ministry put the national turnout at about 410,000 people, while unions claimed about 800,000, the BBC reported. Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez said nearly 1,000 people had been arrested and that the number would rise. Some 70,000 police officers were deployed.

Paris, Marseille, Bordeaux, Lyon

The Paris march from Porte d'Italie to Porte de Vincennes was largely peaceful until its tail end, when masked youths smashed the windows of a car dealership, threw objects and fireworks at officers and put up barricades. Police answered with tear gas, water cannons and baton charges, and the operation included an elite unit that normally handles organized crime and terrorism, according to the BBC and the Associated Press.

Nuñez said "several thousand radical activists gathered at the rear of the march, including around 500 individuals identified as rioters," AFP reported. In Marseille, protesters set burning barricades of trash bins and metal sheets across streets. In Bordeaux, people in dark clothes and face coverings ripped boards off a building to build a barricade. Police used tear gas in Lyon. Two people were seriously injured, one in Toulouse and one in Clermont-Ferrand, Nuñez said.

Officials did head off a repeat of the previous weekend. That round, about 550,000 marched, more than 2,500 people were arrested, more than 2,000 shops and businesses were hit, about 1,000 police officers were injured, and the damage ran to "hundreds of millions" of euros, France's chambers of commerce said, per the BBC. Paris and other cities imposed overnight curfews afterward. This week President Emmanuel Macron decreed that only marches organized by recognized trade unions would be allowed.

Paris blames the hard left

Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu told the National Assembly on Tuesday that some of the violence showed "the planning, in certain places, of an insurrectionary scheme led by far-left and ultra-left groupuscules," some of whom wanted to "march on the Élysée, on Matignon," Swiss broadcaster RTS reported (quotes translated from French). The government has accused Jean-Luc Mélenchon's party, France Unbowed (LFI), of stoking the anger. When LFI's leader in the Assembly, Mathilde Panot, accused him of scapegoating, Lecornu told her: "You have chosen your camp. It is the camp of shame, and we will fight you."

LFI denies any role and calls the accusation a "state scandal." A security source told AFP that French intelligence found the "ultra-left" and "radical far left" at the forefront of attacks on police and on town halls and other state symbols, but not behind the looting, which it tied to a mix of social-media calls, opportunists and some yellow vests. The same assessment put LFI in a separate "far left" group and said its members marched but caused no incidents, RTS reported.

Macron's government had also quietly prepared to switch off social media if Saturday got out of hand. We reported on that leaked letter here.

Soldiers in Milan

Italy didn't wait to find out. Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's government ordered 500 more soldiers into Milan, on top of the forces already there, and added drone surveillance, checks at train stations and rapid-response units, Euronews reported. Milan was hit by fires, smashed windows and looting on Oct. 17 and 18, unrest that police said drew about 2,000 young people and led to 45 arrests, 34 of them minors.

On Saturday morning, police carried out more than 150 searches in Milan, Monza and about 20 other cities, targeting people suspected in last weekend's violence. Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi has suggested that violence was coordinated. A newly formed "17 October Movement" canceled its advertised meeting points and said it would post new ones just before the marches, making it harder for police to plan.

The marches came anyway. About 10,000 people joined a combined procession in Milan, Euronews said. In Rome, protesters threw bottles and set off firecrackers at a police cordon near Largo di Santa Susanna, and police turned water cannons on them. In Turin, protesters threw stones, bottles and smoke bombs at officers blocking the Mosca Bridge and were met with tear gas. Protesters in Florence threw firecrackers and glass bottles and tried to break through a riot police line, and in Bologna an injured young protester was treated at the scene. Rome's march ran under the slogan "Keep Italy out of the war," against higher defense spending. Near Naples, thousands were expected to march in Castel Volturno against a planned migrant detention and repatriation center.

Brussels and Tirana

In Brussels, several hundred people marched against Belgium's center-right coalition, known as the Arizona government, The Brussels Times reported. Some set barricades and a pile of shared scooters on fire and tried to break through police lines, and officers answered with tear gas. Organizer Celia Ponce told the crowd the goal was to "bring down the Arizona government" and called for a general strike on Nov. 17. Luxury boutiques and high-street shops in central Brussels had boarded up their windows beforehand, Euronews reported.

In Albania, riot police used tear gas, water cannons and rubber bullets on student-led protesters who threw rocks and set a fire at the door of the agriculture ministry, Reuters reported, via The Hindu. The protesters want Prime Minister Edi Rama, in power since 2013, to resign over corruption. Earlier marches this month set fire to government buildings and banks. Marches also went ahead in Madrid and Lisbon, the AP reported.

What comes next

France picks Macron's successor next spring, and the leading candidates are already blaming him and his ministers for the chaos, the BBC noted. Belgian organizers are pointing to the Nov. 17 strike. In Italy, Meloni has promised a tougher response to attacks on police and businesses.