France opens 'attempted murder' probe after rioters set a Paris riot officer on fire despite 70,000 police being deployed
Crowds on the streets of Frankfurt on Saturday night, as around 100 rioters — some in Halloween costumes — smashed open storefronts and attacked emergency workers with Molotov cocktails amid a Gen Z cost-of-living protest that drew an estimated 8,000 demonstrators at its peak.A post shared by @NewsFokus on X showing scenes from Frankfurt am Main under the #GenZRegelt hashtag, as France separately banned Halloween masks ahead of fresh protests.Riot police on the streets of Paris. France banned Halloween masks and deployed 70,000 police and gendarmes nationwide amid warnings of "a very high risk of public disorder.Fires and smoke at Porte de Charenton, Paris, as a French officer was treated for severe burns after a Molotov cocktail struck him — an attack France's interior minister described as attempted murder.
A French gendarme set ablaze by a Molotov cocktail during Halloween night protests described feeling "the flesh starting to sting" as flames spread across his body, with the burning sensation he called "immediate, intense, and long-lasting." Interior minister Laurent Nuñez labelled the attack an "attempted murder" at a press conference as riots swept through Paris, Marseille, Lyon, Toulouse and Bordeaux for a third straight weekend. Across the country, more than 770 people were detained as some 320,000 protesters — a number of them dressed in Halloween costume — marched before masked rioters moved in to hijack the demonstrations.
The targeted officer told French radio RTL he could feel "the flammable substance spreading on his skin, wondering when it would stop" — but returned to duty.
Violence spread beyond France, with German cities looted, Swiss police attacked with paving stones, and Portuguese officers clearing protest camps with baton charges and dogs.
