The damage caused by riots that engulfed more than 200 cities across France in the wake of Nahel Merzouk’s death is estimated to cost insurers a head-spinning €650 million, more than three times the amount registered following the 2005 riots, and well over double the amount previously anticipated, data from France Insurers has revealed.
The insurers’ estimate, which totals up the 11,300 claims linked to the six nights of violence that saw 5,600 vehicles torched, some 1,300 buildings damaged, 3,300 arrests, and over 700 officers injured, comes after the French business association MEDEF said the rioters had caused over €1 billion worth of damage, Le Parisien reports.
90% of the “costs of this urban violence concerns the 3,900 properties of the professionals and local communities affected,” Florence Lustman, the president of the Federation of Insurance wrote in a press release, adding that the remaining claims mainly concern damage to individuals’ vehicles.
According to France Insurers, claims on personal or private property represent 55% of the 650 million euros, while 35% of the claims are related to damage caused to public infrastructure.
“The nature of the damage linked to the violence of recent days is very different from what our country experienced in 2005,” Lustman said, noting that at that time vehicle damage and fire accounted for 80% of claims, which amounted to 204 million euros.
Minister of Economy Bruno Le Maire, at the beginning of this month, requested insurers to extend deadlines to file claims, reduce deductibles, and swiftly provide compensation to businesses and professionals affected by the riots. He also called on banks to show understanding.
Days later, France Insurers urged its members to “reduce” the deductibles for the “small independent traders” affected most by violence that took place during the nearly week-long insurrection, which Pierre Brochand, the ex-director of France’s foreign intelligence agency (DGSE) likened to the French Revolution.
Like Brochand, who described the riots as an “uprising or revolt against the French national state by a significant part of the youth of non-European origin present on its territory,” former presidential candidate Éric Zemmour, in a recent interview with the Spanish press, also argued that there exists a clear and undeniable link between the riots and mass migration.
Others like French Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin have contended that there’s no such connection.
