Shop owners in Paris are bracing for a new weekend of far-left protests against the rising cost of living, after last week’s demonstrations devolved into violence, looting, and arson across France.
In the capital, 451 shops were vandalized on Oct. 17 and 18, including 228 that were looted, according to the City of Paris. The government counts about 3,000 businesses hit nationwide.
On Oct. 22, nearly every store along the Champs-Élysées was barricading its storefront with metal shutters, security grilles, or wooden boards, as bewildered tourists looked on, The Epoch Times observed. Chanel, Lacoste, and Louis Vuitton all had been targeted by looters last week.
Near the Place de la République, workers have been screwing plywood panels over windows and doors, while posters on the boards invite residents to join a neighborhood WhatsApp group against break-ins.
Shops were not the only targets on Oct. 17. In Paris, individuals also forced their way into residential buildings, The Epoch Times witnessed.
Hire Private Security Agents
In a letter sent on Oct. 21 to Paris’s local elected officials, reported by France Info, Police Prefect Patrice Faure urged shop owners near the protest routes to hire private security agents, “possibly with dog-handler teams,” lower their shutters, and consider not opening on Saturday.
The reinforced police deployment cannot on its own guarantee the protection of every establishment, the letter states.
The advice sparked outcry from critics who said protecting citizens is the state’s job, not shopkeepers’.
“The government is asking shopkeepers to pay for private security guards out of their own pockets. This is an admission that it can no longer fulfill its most fundamental duty: protecting the French people,” Sarah Knafo, a member of the European Parliament and one of the leading figures of the conservative Reconquest party, said on X.
“In return,” she said, “can shopkeepers stop paying taxes to the government?”
David Lisnard, the president of New Energy, wrote on X that this is “an unacceptable admission of powerlessness and a complete reversal of fundamental principles.”
“Shopkeepers pay for the repairs, pay taxes so that the state ensures their security, and are now expected to pay a third time for private security,” he said.
Faure later conceded a “clumsiness” in his wording, while stating that protecting shop owners remained the authorities’ responsibility and priority.
Unarmed and Outnumbered
Requests for quotes have doubled since the riots, according to the French Union of Security Professions, the industry federation.
“Calls to our switchboard and email requests have multiplied,” Raphaël Mashhadi, manager of the Paris firm Gardiennage Paris RMS, told The Epoch Times.
Clothing boutiques, grocery stores, and hotels are booking guards in advance “on top of physical protections such as wooden panels,” he said.
A 12-hour night shift costs 420 euros (about $470) before tax, Mashhadi said, against the 10,000 to 20,000 euros he said a smashed storefront window can cost.
“The difference speaks for itself,” he said.
Cyril Baudouin, who runs RPro Sécurité, told The Epoch Times that his activity had risen by 5 percent to 15 percent and that he would turn down requests he could not staff. He called the appeal “a bit unfortunate” for shop owners who already suffered losses and must now pay for their own protection.
“It might have been preferable for the state to pay for the service, or to requisition private security companies, since prefects have the power to do so,” Baudouin said.
Under French law, security guards are normally confined to the premises they are hired to protect, and they can only carry a weapon when lives are considered to be at “exceptional risk,” and even then only with the prefect’s sign-off for each individual assignment.
“We cannot be armed the way police officers and gendarmes are,” Mashhadi said.
Baudouin said a prefectoral order could at least have allowed agents to carry pepper gel on the street during the protest.
“A security agent alone can do nothing. What we saw was not even a crowd; it was a horde of rioters, violent people, and there were many of them,” Baudouin said.
The only option is to evacuate staff, lock up, and call the police, he said, stressing that guards may block a doorway but can’t strike anyone, as a single complaint can cost them their license.
“We are there to prevent, deter, alert, and assist.”
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