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<\/a><\/p>\nPublished On 18 Oct 202618 Oct 2026<\/p>\n
French President Emmanuel Macron has expressed \u201canger and shame\u201d over what he described as violent protesters\u2019 attempts \u201cto bring down the republic\u201d.<\/p>\n
In a televised address to the nation on Sunday, Macron promised that rioters and looters would \u201cpay for their crimes\u201d, after Saturday saw some of the worst urban violence in France in years.<\/p>\n
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The country\u2019s Interior Ministry said that nearly 2,400 people were arrested on Saturday, with about 1,000 police and gendarmes injured.<\/p>\n
Macron said there must be a distinction between protesters with \u201clegitimate demands\u201d and \u201cthose who destroyed, smashed, and looted\u201d.<\/p>\n
The president pledged to launch a \u201ccrisis unit\u201d to provide \u201curgent aid \u2026 for those who are going through difficult moments\u201d. He added that \u201clessons will be learned\u201d after the destructive violence erupted this weekend.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need to be clear: yesterday, our law enforcement officers and officials, despite their professionalism, were subjected to unprecedented violence in several cities,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve asked the government to provide all the lessons learned and to be able to anticipate it to make sure that this does not happen again,\u201d Macron said, adding: \u201cWe need unity, we need calm and respect.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"PARIS,](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/getty_6ad518f414-1792350452.jpg\")
Protests across France descended into violence and looting across the country [Carl Court\/Getty Images]<\/p>\n
Reporting from Paris, Al Jazeera\u2019s Natacha Butler said Macron\u2019s speech had \u201cperhaps no surprises\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhether it\u2019s going to be enough to placate some people, I\u2019m not really sure, because those who have been out protesting say they\u2019re fed up of hearing these sorts of speeches by the French president,\u201d Butler said.<\/p>\n
The protests are quickly becoming a political football for parties vying for public support ahead of presidential elections next year.<\/p>\n
Left-wing presidential candidate Jean-Luc Melenchon said the French government is \u201csolely responsible\u201d for the destruction during protests, and has \u201cfailed to organise the maintenance of public order\u201d.<\/p>\n
Far-right presidential hopeful Jordan Bardella called Macron\u2019s Sunday speech \u201clamentable\u201d and \u201ccowardly\u201d, saying the government has nothing left to offer the French people and \u201ccannot even protect them\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"President Macron promises to increase security, but stops short of announcing a state of emergency or curfew. Published…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":933080,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4868,2057,2592,43,44,17736,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-933079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-emmanuel-macron","tag-europe","tag-france","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-protests","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/933079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=933079"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/933079\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/933080"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=933079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=933079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=933079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}