France arrests about 2,000 after protests as fire devastates Limoges city hall

The provisional total rose as violence spread across several cities; the collapse of the historic building’s spire and roof left its structural future unclear.

Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez said about 2,000 people had been arrested.
More than 600 police, gendarmes and firefighters were reported injured.
Limoges city hall’s spire and roof collapsed in a fire on Saturday.
France’s National Assembly president plans to propose an inquiry on Tuesday.

France had arrested about 2,000 people by Sunday after demonstrations over living costs and school conditions turned violent in several cities, Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez said. The figure was provisional. He also reported more than 600 injuries among police officers, gendarmes and firefighters; it was not a count of injured demonstrators.¹

In Limoges, masked people broke into the city hall at about 6pm on Saturday and set it alight, according to the local prefecture. The spire and roof collapsed as the fire spread, and officials described the 19th-century building as largely destroyed. No structural-safety assessment or decision on whether it can be restored had been reported by Sunday.²

The demonstrations drew an estimated 550,000 people nationwide, according to the Interior Ministry; organisers put attendance at about 800,000. The marches brought together labour unions, student groups and activists associated with the Yellow Vest movement. Violence and damage were also reported in Paris, Marseille and Lyon.³

Nuñez blamed the violence on far-left groups and said looters had joined in. In Limoges, the prefecture described more than 500 people in a crowd of about 2,000 as deliberately seeking confrontation. These were official characterisations; authorities had not established which specific acts were organised or opportunistic.¹²

The provisional injury total does not include a complete national count of demonstrators hurt. Separate reports said a 17-year-old girl in Mulhouse lost sight in one eye and a young protester in Saint-Étienne lost a hand; prosecutors opened an investigation into the Mulhouse injury.³⁴

Yaël Braun-Pivet, president of the National Assembly, said she would propose an inquiry on Tuesday into the violence, the groups involved and the policing response.⁵

France arrests about 2,000 after protests as fire devastates Limoges city hall

Footnotes