France protests: "There's a constant back and forth over who's actually responsible"

Well, the unrest has increased pressure on President Macron and his government. Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu said the government would not be intimidated by violence and blamed the unrest on ultra-left and criminals. All day long, fellow citizens faced a violent far-left, a highly organized network that sought to attack property, people and the institutions of the Republic. Clearly, the centers of power in Paris were targeted. Palais Matignon and the National Assembly so this is clearly a political maneuver that accepts violence and as i said earlier and i'll say it again we will not be intimidated joining us for more on that is France 24's Matthew Mary Cariche, Matthew Mary hello to you so tell us more about what the Macron government has been saying and the blame game that's been taking place well first off all sides and all around the political spectrum they all are pushing for peace and for an end to all the violence. But as we heard in the SOT, Macron and his government are putting the blame squarely on the left, saying that the left is pushing people to violence. But this quote that we just heard was actually a response to the left that had said beforehand, which was when Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of the left, had blamed the violence on the police and saying that it was the police response to the protesters, the mass arrests, the beatings, the tear gas. And it was this response that was pushing the protesters to react in violence. And so then in response, you have Le Cornu saying, no, no, no, it's the left that is pushing all these protesters to violence. So there's this constant back and forth of who is actually responsible for this. And it's really kind of strange to think like, is this violence coming from the top down? Or is this violence just kind of a natural response to these mass hordes of people being pushed into small states, small areas by the police, and having nowhere to go, feeling violent, feeling upset, and this kind of organic reaction. Now, in response to what Lecornu said before, then we have Mélenchon, he's saying clearly, like, we are not part of this violence. And he said, we are not part of those who loot and destroy. His message is clear, and we'll bring up a quote. He says, those who share our struggle have no place in the looting and vandalism. Regardless of the government's responsibilities, the incompetence of its officials, the violence they perpetrate, we must refuse to participate in actions that have no political significance and run counter to our methods. And he's saying that the actions and words of Le Cornu are playing with fire and are risking a regime crisis. He also denounced the media, including us, for focusing on the images of violence and ignoring the thousands upon thousands of protesters who are coming out to protest peacefully and have no part in it. He's been trying to keep the discussion really focused on the protests and why they're happening in the first place. And what have the far right been saying? Where do they come in in all of this? Well, the far right is aligning itself with the center, with the government, saying it is the far left that is responsible for all this violence. And you have to remember that we are in the middle of a presidential election, which is expected to be a runoff between the far left and the far right as Macron cannot run again. And Le Pen is using this opportunity to blame her for first-team candidate of opposition. She is saying the speeches by Jean-Luc Mélenchon's lawmakers, legitimizing violence, viewing orders of repression and disorder on the right, they are plunging the country into chaos. Now, her speech has been echoed by the leader of her party, Bordella, who also calls the left the professionals of chaos, and an ally of the national rally, Eric Ciotti, denounced the presence of what he called red fascism in the streets. This, of course, is provoking even more responses from the left. The mayor of Paris is socialist in his government, and his deputy mayor, Lamia El Raj, has accused Le Pen's party of fueling these tensions around the protest to further her ambition and her career goals. She said the National Rally is acting like a pyromaniac firefighter, using these protests to get a political leg up. But right now, it's unclear whether voters will be swayed as to that the national political parties on either side are responsible for what's going on in the streets. All right, Matthew-Mary Carachet, thank you very much indeed for now. Well, let's get a picture of what's happening at Place de la République. Our reporter Antonio Kerrigan is there for us. Antonio, tell us what's going on around you. Well, after unofficial calls to protest have continued circulating on social media following yesterday when 110,000 people were in the streets of Paris, crowds have gathered once again. And it very quickly was the reaction from the police very quickly was tear gas when the numbers were still very small. We've just heard another loud bang. That's kids running again as CRS police officers are moving in closer to the protesters. We've seen them charged a few times. You'll have seen those young people mostly running behind me. And I see tear gas as well just opposite that's detonated. So it's really heating up here. The police presence is fairly spectacular. And the number of protesters is nothing in the kind of scale of what there was yesterday. But certainly it seems that the police ethos today is anything undeclared, Any unauthorised protesting will be met with absolute, essentially, repression, that they will not allow unauthorised protests to go ahead. And they're doing pretty much everything in their power to disperse protesters pretty much immediately. We've seen them pin young people to the walls. We've seen them tackle people. We've also seen a protester, for instance, throwing a wooden board at the police. We've seen it's extremely tense on both sides. And we understand the police ethos is extremely firm today, especially, of course, following how events degenerated last night. Antonio, you've been speaking to a few eyewitnesses, as we understand it. What have some of them been saying regarding what they saw last night, as well as the extent of the damage today? Well, of course, we've heard from a representative of a shop owners union saying 1,500 shops across France were affected by the vandalism. I'm actually joined by Adam Tiernan, who's a local resident and who was an eyewitness to some of these events last night. Adam, tell us what you saw last night. Yeah, so the protest yesterday during the day was one of the calmest, happiest protests I've been in a long time. I was in the official protest, which came, left Place de la République to Place de Clichy. Very few police, nothing of issue I saw during the day. I came home last night around 6pm and there are two independent shops below me. One an ice cream shop and one a clothing shop that had been completely destroyed. As I was arriving home, the people, the youths, mostly teenagers, were still inside the shops taking what was left, if anything. Fires on the streets were still ongoing. The people were in shock. I was in shock. some people were in tears people were trying to protect their own shops but there was not much they could do it was really really devastating and it's very devastating for me now seeing what's happening today and one thing that we've heard from a lot of business owners in this area of course is this feeling that they've been abandoned did you see a police presence where it was needed yesterday? I did not see one single police officer last night the children were running around freely anyone was going into the shops it was completely we were abandoned the shops were abandoned it was it was a free-for-all and you also described seeing uh to me earlier you described having seen a business owner who was in his shop a witness to what was happening can you describe what you saw there yes not far from here there was a business owner sat down on what used to be his window uh the window had obviously been um completely broken and as he was sat down almost completely speechless devastated people going in and out of his shop taking what was left it was a used phone shop and i presume he was an independent business owner and everything he'd worked up for had now gone um there were some children offering him beers in condolence um but it was it was really devastating to see his reaction his face he was completely destroyed i've seen him today i've spoken to him briefly today and again he's the same he's completely speechless and i think he feels lost. And I think a lot of shop owners around here feel lost. Of course, those we've been speaking to have been explaining to us that they can't reopen their businesses until they've had a chance to rebuild. And of course, they can't file an insurance claim until police officers have come to do an inventory of the damage. And so until then, they're somewhat living in suspense. Now, what we're expecting next, of course, is we'll be following how things continue to develop to develop here today at République as the protests continue. But we're also expecting to hear from the president this evening. I've seen a call circulating. It remains to be seen how that or if that will be followed. But a call to bang spoons on saucepans outside windows tonight during Emmanuel Macron's address to the nation. But what we can expect from that is he'll be announcing whatever the government response is going to be. We know that there's an inter-ministerial crisis meeting going on this evening just across the road from the Elysee Palace and we'll be keeping an eye on what he says but what we expect is an announcement that is to the effect that there will be absolutely no laxism in response to these events, that justice will be harsh justice, that there won't be and they don't want anyone getting away with anything that happened last night. Certainly ongoingly. We hope that today these residual protests will go much better and much more calmly. Antonio, thank you very much indeed for bringing us those updates. We'll of course be checking in with you throughout the evening as we continue to keep a very close eye on everything that's unfolding here in Paris. Thank you, Antonio.