# French interior minister acknowledges ‘failure’ at parliamentary inquiry into October 17 unrest

- URL: https://talkfuse.com/story/french-interior-minister-acknowledges-failure-at-parliamentary-inquiry-into-october-17-unrest/
- Published: 2026-11-04T13:36:46+00:00
- Updated: 2026-11-05T10:09:54+00:00
- Original publisher: Le Monde (publisher lean: Left)
- Original article: https://www.lemonde.fr/en/politics/article/2026/11/04/french-interior-minister-acknowledges-failure-at-parliamentary-inquiry-into-october-17-unrest_6771613_5.html
- Topics: Europe, Government, Politics, World

## Key points

- Nuñez called the response to 17 October unrest a failure.
- About 550,000 people joined demonstrations nationwide.
- More than 3,000 businesses were looted.

## Summary

French Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez told a parliamentary inquiry that the response to unrest during demonstrations on 17 October was a “failure”. He accepted responsibility for failing to anticipate the violence, which involved widespread looting and damage across several cities.

Nuñez said the day brought together several kinds of events, including planned demonstrations, unplanned marches and looting, and argued that simply deploying more police would not have prevented the damage. Authorities had forecast 60,000 to 110,000 demonstrators outside Paris, but about 550,000 people took to the streets nationwide, including 110,000 in Paris; more than 3,000 businesses were looted. He defended the use of crowd-control weapons, noting that 22,000 tear-gas grenades were fired, while the inquiry continues through February.

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Summarised by TalkFuse (https://talkfuse.com/). Quote the original publisher for the reporting and link this page for the summary and discussion.