Halloween Night Riots Hit France and Germany as Cost-of-Living Unrest Snowballs Across the EU

The Halloween weekend brought a new night of unrest to the European Union on Saturday, October 31, 2026, as the cost-of-living protest wave that started in France two weeks earlier spread with force into Germany. Daytime marches were largely peaceful in both countries, but small violent groups took over after dark, looting stores, attacking police with Molotov cocktails and setting barricades on fire. France and Germany were the two EU countries that recorded significant rioting during the day of October 31 and the night into November 1.

France: a third Saturday of clashes

France remained the epicenter of the unrest. For what organizers called Act III of the movement against the high cost of living, backed by the Yellow Vests, labor unions and high school and university students, the Interior Ministry counted about 320,000 demonstrators nationwide, including 70,000 in Paris. Turnout fell from roughly 410,000 on October 24 and 550,000 on October 17, the day when riots and looting first caught security forces off guard and left a trail of damaged shops, public buildings and businesses across the country.

Interior Minister Laurent Nunez kept 70,000 police officers and gendarmes on duty, moved authorized marches away from city centers and banned evening gatherings from 20:00, after social media messages used Halloween to call for looting and insurrection. Tactical units, helicopters, armored vehicles and water cannons were part of the deployment, and many stores in Paris and other cities boarded up their windows on Friday.

Clashes broke out at the end of several marches in Paris, Lyon, Toulouse, Marseille and Montpellier, where police fired tear gas. In Paris, five members of the security forces were injured, three of them by Molotov cocktails, including a gendarme whose uniform caught fire. At least 1,193 officers had been injured since the movement began.

Rennes: barricades near the railway station

Rennes, in Brittany, saw some of the most intense street fighting of the day. Between 13,500 people according to the prefecture and more than 20,000 according to unions marched peacefully along an approved route, after the regional prefect banned all demonstrations in the city center, close to the district hit by violence on October 17 and 24. A second, unauthorized march then broke away and was pushed back toward the railway station, where protesters faced police in the area of avenue Janvier. A violent group built burning barricades on the esplanade Charles de Gaulle before crowds were dispersed around 18:30. Final scuffles broke out at place Sainte-Anne around 20:00.

Police made 46 arrests in Rennes and 61 across Brittany, where Brest also experienced clashes.

Halloween night in France

The night brought scattered urban violence rather than a repeat of October 17. In the Bas-Rhin department around Strasbourg, 22 cars and about 50 trash bins were set on fire, far more than the nine vehicles burned on Halloween 2025. In the neighboring Haut-Rhin, firefighters responded to 36 urban fires around Mulhouse, Colmar and Saint-Louis. Lyon stayed relatively calm, although five people were arrested shortly before 21:30 near place Carnot for carrying explosive materials. On the overseas island of Reunion, about 300 hostile youths gathered in the Chaudron district of Saint-Denis, with around 50 fires and three vehicles burned. In Nice, the mayor imposed a curfew on unaccompanied minors from 22:00 to 06:00.

Germany: looting in Frankfurt, clashes in Cologne and Berlin

The youth movement Gen Z regelt, which translates as Gen Z has got this, staged protests in more than 30 cities, with organizers claiming over 100,000 participants. Its demands include more funding for schools, addiction services and psychotherapy, action on living costs, social fairness and climate protection. Daytime rallies were peaceful, but the situation escalated in several cities once the official events ended.

Frankfurt suffered the worst violence. Up to 8,000 people marched through the city before police dissolved the procession shortly after 18:00. Rioters then smashed shop windows on the Zeil, the main shopping street, looted stores, broke into a gun shop and threw Molotov cocktails at officers. Police brought in special forces, water cannons and a helicopter, cleared and sealed off the Zeil by 22:12 and recovered two stolen weapons. More than 30 people were detained overnight, and police described the damage as considerable, with several shops placed under police protection on Sunday morning.

In Cologne, police used water cannons on the Rhine riverbank after stones and fireworks were thrown at them, and officers were attacked on the cathedral square next to the main station. In Berlin, a peaceful rally at the Brandenburg Gate was followed by a radical left-wing march of about 700 people from Rosenthaler Platz to Prenzlauer Berg, marked by firecracker attacks. Police reported 27 officers lightly injured and up to 56 people detained in the capital. Masked groups set construction barriers on fire near Hamburg main station, up to 200 people destroyed several public transport stops in Leipzig, and Stuttgart police recorded about 50 offenses with five officers lightly hurt. In Karlsruhe, mounted police broke up a spontaneous crowd of 800 people. Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt said the strong police presence had prevented the kind of violent excesses seen in Paris.

A snowball effect across borders

The Halloween events confirmed a contagion pattern that has been building since mid-October. Local rioters are clearly encouraged by images of looting and clashes in other countries, which circulate widely on social networks and messaging apps. The German movement openly followed the French protest wave, and anonymous online calls copied French tactics, such as wearing black clothes and Halloween masks to avoid being identified. Each night of disorder in one city becomes a template for the next, creating a snowball effect that pushes the unrest from one country to another and makes every weekend a new risk for police forces.

What is driving the unrest

There is no single trigger. The protests combine anger over higher fuel and energy prices, a housing affordability crisis, poor conditions in schools and universities, declining public services and budget cuts in heavily indebted states. Many young protesters also point to a weaker entry-level job market and a feeling that their generation will live less well than their parents. Peaceful marchers make up the vast majority, but organized groups exploit the crowds and the festive Halloween context to loot and attack police.

Impact on business and supply chains

The repeated riots are weighing on city-center retail, which lost weekend sales as stores boarded up, closed early or were looted. Shopping districts such as the Zeil in Frankfurt were sealed off for hours, public transport around stations in Rennes, Cologne and Hamburg was disrupted, and delivery access to restricted zones was limited. Insurers face a growing number of claims for broken windows, burned vehicles and stolen goods.

The situation remains active, and French unions have called a general strike for November 5, which could add disruption to transport, ports and freight logistics in the coming days.