Macron Shelves Germany State Visit Over France Riots Crisis

The German presidency announced that Macron spoke by telephone with German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier “and informed him of the situation in his country.”

President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday informed Berlin he was postponing a state visit to deal with the urban rioting that has rocked France for the last four nights, as the 17-year-old whose killing by police sparked the protests was laid to rest.

Police arrested 1,311 people overnight Friday to Saturday, the highest figure since the violent protests began over the point-blank killing by a policeman of Nahel M. in the Paris suburb of Nanterre on Tuesday.

Shops were ransacked and town halls attacked in various locations nationwide, despite the interior ministry sending out 45,000 members of the police and also armoured vehicles to deal with the rioting.

Police officers detain a protester (R) and stand guard in front of the shopping mall Rosny 2 in Rosny-sous-Bois, in the eastern suburbs of Paris, on June 30, 2023, during riots that broke out after the shooting of a teenage driver by French police in a Paris suburb on June 27. (Photo by Bertrand GUAY / AFP)

The protests over the death of teenager Nahel M., who was of Algerian origin, have again exposed the severe racial tensions in modern France and increased scrutiny on the police who have long been accused of singling out minorities.

The crisis is a hugely unwelcome development for Macron, who was looking forward to pressing on with his second mandate after seeing off protests that erupted in January over raising the pensions age.