Paris extends curfew for third night after riot looting

Police in Paris imposed a curfew for the third night in a row on Wednesday, banning gatherings in parts of the capital after riots and looting broke out around protests on 17 and 18 October, police said.

The restrictions, ordered by the Paris police prefecture, cover the areas around the Élysée presidential palace, the National Assembly, the Senate, the Champs-Élysées and several railway stations, running from eight in the evening on Wednesday until six the next morning. The orders apply to both minors and adults and are backed by a national police helicopter, police said.

The Paris police prefecture said on Wednesday that 30 more suspects had been identified and brought before prosecutors in separate looting cases, using CCTV footage from the riots. Officers recovered 120 pairs of sunglasses worth more than €45,000, along with sports equipment, make-up and clothing, the prefecture said.

Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu told parliament that the unrest was part of a "destabilisation agenda" that he said was being driven by the radical left, and said he did not accept social anger as a justification for looting shops during protests. He said France's anti-terrorism prosecutor's office and a specialist anti-terrorism unit were involved after a fire in Limoges, and that the first person arrested over that fire was flagged under the state's national security watch list.

Lecornu also denied accusations, reported by French outlet Mediapart, that police were gathering political intelligence on citizens, calling them false and accusing the France Unbowed party of adopting them. He repeated an earlier proposal for a law under which people who cause damage during unrest would be made to pay for the cost of repairs themselves, rather than the state or shopkeepers bearing it.