MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
France's prime minister this morning is asking local officials to impose, quote, "limited curfews" tonight in some places. It's the government's reaction to riots over the weekend that overshadowed largely peaceful marches across the country. Roving bands destroyed property, looted stores and fought with police.
LEILA FADEL, HOST:
About 2,300 people were arrested and nearly a thousand police officers injured, according to the interior ministry.
MARTIN: Our correspondent Eleanor Beardsley is there and has been following all this. Hello, Eleanor.
ELEANOR BEARDSLEY, BYLINE: Good morning, Michel.
MARTIN: So, Eleanor, if you were watching the news, you saw these images of violence. What was the response last night from President Emmanuel Macron?
BEARDSLEY: Well, let's have a listen.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
PRESIDENT EMMANUEL MACRON: (Speaking French).
BEARDSLEY: He said nothing justifies, explains or excuses the violence. He spoke of all of France's shame to see its towns and streets sacked. He said delinquents would be punished, but said in no way should the violence take away from the legitimate demands of peaceful protesters.
Let's remember this started as a student protest over better conditions and has widened to include public-sector workers against, you know, skyrocketing energy prices, high cost of living, inequality in society. But Macron didn't really give any concrete proposals. He's leaving that to his prime minister. So he was immediately eviscerated by the left and the right for not being tough enough and not offering solutions.
MARTIN: So I know you've been out talking to people. What are they telling you?
BEARDSLEY: Oh, yeah. I was out in the streets of Paris yesterday. What a mess. Burned bikes, glass, charred debris everywhere, graffiti scrawled on looted stores saying things like tax the rich and capitalism kills. And I spoke with 23-year-old Sarah Berlia in front of a charred Range Rover on the street.
SARAH BERLIA: I think it's coming from a frustrated generation, and generation with less and less rights and opportunities and a worse and worse environment.
MARTIN: You know, though, we're used to seeing a lot of demonstrations in France. But this level of violence - I mean, why do people think it's gotten to this level?
BEARDSLEY: Yeah. Everyone is actually asking that. You know, for starters, yes, there is this whole protest culture in France, and it often draws small groups of troublemakers. But what we're seeing this time is massive, so is it just a confluence of things that got out of control or something deeper? Anyway, the government spoke of opportunist rioters. It said ultraleft groups who want to fight police came out, and other delinquents, as Macron called them, had shown up to pillage. Yesterday, young people were still skirmishing with police in pockets. And I was out in - at Paris' Place de la Republique. I spoke with 18-year-old Lila Barre, a student. And let me warn you - this clip contains sounds of police firing tear gas.
LILA BARRE: We are young people. We are students. And we don't like Macron. We hate Macron. And it's, like, 10 years of repression, of violence. We don't have enough money to live. So now we are angry.
(SOUNDBITE OF TEAR GAS EXPLODING)
BARRE: The police is...
BEARDSLEY: So yeah. She was one of the many youths out there yesterday playing cat-and-mouse with the police.
MARTIN: So look. There's an election in six months. What is your sense of the political implications of all this?
BEARDSLEY: Well, far-left presidential candidate for the France Unbowed party, Jean-Luc Melenchon, has been out with the protesters. He's totally capitalizing on these protests, which are overwhelmingly left and far-left. There are just as many slogans against Macron out there as there are against far-right leader Marine Le Pen. Now, far-right leader Marine Le Pen is currently in the lead in polls six months ahead of the presidential election. She has condemned the violence and the government of Macron, but she's being careful not to alienate the students or the working-class protesters. In fact, she said that, quote, "legitimate social demands" had been "hijacked by the far-left." And she said the rhetoric of Jean-Luc Melenchon is fostering chaos by legitimizing violence.
MARTIN: That is NPR's Eleanor Beardsley in Paris. Eleanor, thank you.
BEARDSLEY: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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