Paris, France – Jagged shards of glass frame the hole kicked through the window of Hassan Rashdul’s mobile phone shop near Place de la Republique, the epicentre of looting and rioting that swept this part of Paris on Saturday. The glass countertop is shattered, the floor carpeted with broken glass. The display cases that were full of new and reconditioned mobile phones, iPads, and computers are empty.
The walls where headphones, cables, phone cases and other accessories hung have been stripped bare. We’re not operating to keep the business going, but just to survive, really.” Rashdul says he’s lost at least 70,000-euros ($78,600) worth of stock. His insurance won’t cover it, because loss from theft wasn’t included in his policy, though Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu has said the government will cover employee salaries of about 3,000 businesses across France affected by the rioting.
There will also be a “dedicated support fund” to help businesses restock, the French government has announced. Lecornu has ordered more than 200 investigators to work on catching the perpetrators of the riots and looting. But the rioters are moving quickly: Some businesses say they found their stock being sold online within hours of being looted.
According to the French commerce ministry, representatives of Vinted, Amazon, eBay, Leboncoin, Meta and TikTok, as well as French online retail association Fevad, were invited. Around Rashdul’s shop, there are mini-markets, opticians, phone stores and cafes that bear testimony to the violence last weekend. Others, where there’s nothing left to steal, have been left open and exposed to the damp October weather by their owners.
But amid his suffering, Rashdul spots a glimmer of hope. It took Rashdul, who immigrated to France from Bangladesh, 10 years to build his business. He now calls himself a proud French citizen – respectful of the right to protest but also worried about the impact of violence on businesses like his, and on France as a whole.
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