France has drafted in extra security forces including army troops to try to prevent any repeat of violence during gilets jaunes protests in Paris or other cities this weekend, reports The Guardian.
Police, gendarmes and soldiers will be deployed in a show of force in the capital and in the southern city of Nice, where the president, Emmanuel Macron, will meet his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, for a state visit on Sunday.
Despite a ban on protests in parts of Nice, yellow vest organisers have called for a demonstration there on Saturday, the 19th day of action. Protests are also expected in other French cities.
Critics see the deployment of troops from Operation Sentinelle, which was established after the 2015 terrorist attacks in Paris, as provocative. Macron’s administration views the potential escalation of civil unrest as a serious challenge to its authority and is determined to regain the upper hand after it was accused of being unprepared for last week’s riots.
Last weekend protests in Paris were hijacked by rioters and looters who destroyed luxury shops, newspaper kiosks and one of the country’s most exclusive restaurants on the Champs Élysées. The Paris police prefect was sacked after his officers were accused of failing to stop the unrest.
The interior minister, Christophe Castaner, spoke to the mayor of Nice, Christian Estrosi, and the local prefect, Georges-François Leclerc, on Thursday to reassure them that security forces would be deployed to avoid a repeat of last weekend’s clashes and destruction.
Estrosi said a “large strategic area” of Nice, stretching from the airport to the area west of the port popular with tourists, had been designated off-limits to demonstrators.
However, some gilets jaunes said they would ignore the ban. “We the citizens are claiming the right to freely demonstrate. We gilets jaunes are on the streets to make our claims heard. Once again the state is acting against the fundamental rights of our society,” the group said in a statement.
It said gilets jaunes had been demonstrating in Nice for four months without serious violence. “On Saturday it will be the same people demonstrating in the same spirit. We haven’t changed. The gilets jaunes of Nice haven’t radicalised in a week.”