Authorities say they are determined to prevent another weekend of looting, burned cars and attacks on public buildings.
France braces for a second wave of protests after worst riots in years
A 17-year-old protester in France has pushed back against media coverage overemphasising the looting and property destruction that unfolded last weekend.
“I’m here to protest for all the high schoolers who got beaten by the police,” the student told Al Jazeera in Paris. “We haven’t been listened to about our problems.”
Gesturing at the peaceful protest unfolding along the southeastern edge of the capital, the high schooler noted that “it’s pretty calm … it’s a real protest”.
“I hope that journalists will actually show the truth, and not just people who are breaking everything, burning trash,” the demonstrator added. “I think it’s important to show that protesters aren’t just people who like violence – it’s also people who are screaming their needs.”
Our correspondent on the ground is reporting some tension in central Paris.
Police fired tear gas and water cannon to disperse the crowd.
At the last minute, police ordered the march to be moved from Bastille in the capital’s centre to the southeastern edge of the city.
Reporting from Paris, France
Thousands of people have joined the protest in the French capital.
One of the protesters marching along the designated route said he had “never” seen such a big crowd in his life.
The light rain and cold temperature failed to dampen the spirit of the protesters, many of whom chanted slogans against the police accompanied by a brass band.
A police helicopter hovered overhead beneath the grey sky as the rain grew steadily heavier.
Police in the city of Bordeaux in southwest France are warning that some protesters are setting up barricades, throwing projectiles and “attacking law enforcement”, without providing more details.
A brief video shared by the prefecture on X showed people in hoods and masks removing wooden slabs from outside a building and using them to set up a barricade on a nearby road.
Police are urging people to avoid the area.
The front of the official march in south-eastern Paris has ended “without incident”, the AFP news agency reports.
Police watched on as people began peeling away from the Porte de Vincennes, some chanting “We are not happy”.
Although the march unfolded in a calm and festive atmosphere, there was widespread frustration with the last-minute crackdown on demonstrators that forced them to the edge of the city.
“It undermines not only our ‘liberte’ [freedom] but also our ‘fraternite’ [solidarity],” said Paris protester Lea Berthelot, referring to France’s national motto.
Security forces have been deployed across multiple Italian cities in advance of expected demonstrations later today.
Riot police gathered in Rome as surveillance helicopters hovered over Milan’s central Piazza Del Duomo, where hundreds of soldiers also roamed the streets.
Italy this week approved the use of troops and tougher legal penalties following protests last weekend that occasionally turned violent, with groups of mostly young people looting shops, smashing windows and clashing with the police.
Protesters have been spurred by similar frustrations as those in France, including soaring fuel and energy prices, high rents, low wages and poor public services.
The protests in France are a reflection of deepening “political decay” gripping Paris and Europe writ large, according to Gregoire Roos from Chatham House.
“The broader background is a country that has lost its direction, with weak political leadership,” the director of the think tank’s Europe, Russia and Eurasia programmes told Al Jazeera. Since Macron dissolved parliament in 2024, France has “had no stable government; no stable majority”.
“This has heightened the sense of political decay,” added Roos.
Across Europe, the analyst said, citizens are still grappling with the fallout of the 2008 global financial crisis, coupled with skyrocketing inflation and now the looming threat of artificial intelligence.
“The crisis of the social contract is felt in more or less the same way across the continent,” Roos said.
A union representative has slammed the police order forcing Paris protesters to the southeastern rim of the city.
It’s “scandalous” that President Emmanuel Macron forbade protesters from demonstrating “where we wish to demonstrate”, union representative Murielle Guilbert said in comments reported by AFP.
“We are here today, quite obviously, because there is immense social anger in this country and because wages have still not been increased to the level they should be,” Guilbert added.
As we’ve been reporting, demonstrations at the Bastille were shifted to near-suburban Paris at the last minute.
Macron said on Thursday that “illegitimate” protests would be banned over the weekend.
Speaking to Al Jazeera in southeastern Paris, demonstrators have railed against the authorities’ decision to push the march to the edge of the city.
“They’re scared. They’re scared of us,” said one protester, Lena, as she brandished a sign above her head. “They know we’re angry, and they know we want to fight for justice and social justice, and they’re trying to push us away – make us scared of them.”
“But we’re not going to pull back,” Lena added. “We’re going to fight again and again and again against the government.”
Police have fired tear gas against protesters in multiple cities, AFP is reporting.
Journalists saw riot squads use tear gas in Lyon, Lille, Toulouse and Nantes.
We’ll bring you more as we have it.
Since mid-September, high school students have been protesting against teacher shortages, overcrowded classrooms and dilapidated school buildings.
Their demands for education reforms have grown into a nationwide movement to channel mounting anger over failing public services, rising living costs and a future that feels increasingly out of reach.
Student activists have called for a comprehensive overhaul of Parcoursup, the university admissions system, which many students consider discriminatory, and a 1.5bn euros ($1.7bn) emergency plan to improve school infrastructure before winter and summer.
There have also been calls for an additional 10bn euros ($11.2bn) for education, more teachers on permanent rather than precarious contracts and 250,000 additional university places.
The protests come months before the 2027 presidential election and have further sharpened political divisions, with parties seeking to present themselves as the answer to the frustration visible on the streets.
Jean-Luc Melenchon has said attempts by police to quash protests are a “total failure”.
The head of the left-wing party France Unbowed (La France Insoumise or LFI) wrote on X that marchers at the newly authorised location were “flowing calmly” across several kilometres.
“Total victory for the social movement,” Melenchon said, accompanied by a video of thousands of demonstrators. “The provocations for disorder by the Paris police prefect and Lecornu are a total failure. For the authorities, it is time to give in, or soon they will have only the exit door left.”
Reporting from Paris, France
Thousands of people are marching in the capital, Paris, in what they call the Second Act, after more than half a million people poured in the streets in nationwide protests that turned violent last weekend.
It is a very different scene compared with October 17. The situation is calm, and protesters appear cheerful. “This is the end of the Macronian monarchy,” read a banner.
While fewer police officers were visible at the march, authorities have said 70,000 police officers have been deployed across the country.
What is important is that we are not in the heart of the capital but at the edge of it – as authorities have allowed only these protests to take place and to take place here. All other protests have been banned – a move that has drawn widespread criticism.
“This is a tactic by the government to try to run the movement out of steam,” said Emma, a protester.
Reporting from Paris, France
There was a lot of back-and-forth between the unions and the prefecture of the police, who initially banned an earlier route.
There’s a lot of frustration and anger that they’ve been forced to take this protest to the edge of the city. This is about as far as you can come to the edge of Paris where the authorities can legitimately still get away with saying they’ve allowed a demonstration in Paris. But we’re in an almost suburban part of Paris.
The fact that people have been pushed out here has caused frustration – remember, this time last Saturday, the protests were very peaceful. They’re peaceful now.
The protesters are mainly students, and now unions join the protests. Students are complaining about the poor facilities for their education; others are complaining about the high cost of living.
They’re out determined to get their message across, despite what they say is an attempt by the police and the authorities to get them out of view.
Police have issued a statement on social media accompanied by aerial footage, saying all is “calm” in the streets of Paris.
Tout est calme dans les rues de Paris, le dispositif de la @prefpolice est en place, au sol et dans les airs, afin de permettre aux manifestants de pouvoir défiler en toute sécurité de la Porte d’Italie à la Porte de Vincennes via les boulevards des Maréchaux. pic.twitter.com/VeefAGDzyG
— Préfecture de Police (@prefpolice) October 24, 2026
Reporting from Paris, France
We’re about an hour after this planned protest was supposed to start at Bastille – the original route of the protest that has now been pushed to southeast Paris.
There is still a police presence, but not a very heavy one. As people approach the square, officers sometimes check their bags. And they are essentially directing them to the metro.
At the moment, it remains fairly calm here; it does not seem that anybody is trying to defy the ban.
We are still in the middle of the afternoon, and of course, we will be bracing for what could happen this evening – to see whether or not people will try to defy this ban in the centre of the city.
Marine Le Pen’s far-right party, National Rally, is holding its party congress in Orleans, marking the start of its presidential campaign.
The event drew 11,000 counterprotesters to the city, according to France’s Interior Ministry, while protest organisers said 26,000 participants attended the counter-demonstration.
Shops and public landmarks were barricaded in advance of the protest.
Police have fired tear gas to disperse some 150 people protesting in Lyon, in an area banned to all demonstrations, according to AFP.
The news agency said police moved in as demonstrators tried to block a road in the southeastern city.
They fired several tear gas grenades to clear the group near a university faculty and the city’s police station.
French Interior Minister Laurent Nunez says police have arrested 135 people nationwide, adding that, so far, “there has been no major incident.”
Weapons confiscated included metal balls, lead pellets, fireworks, slingshots, steel balls, improvised weapons, a katana and airsoft weapons, he said.
Paris police described the situation as “calm” at midday.
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