France has deployed 70,000 police officers across the country on Saturday as authorities brace for another wave of nationwide protests following last weekend’s violence and looting.

Interior minister Laurent Nunez said on Friday that elite security teams and heavily armed mobile units would be mobilised alongside regular police officers to prevent a repeat of the unrest.

“We will be uncompromising with rioters, looters and all those who commit acts of violence,” Mr Nunez told reporters.

He said the government was preparing for potentially violent demonstrations, warning that radical groups had been encouraging attacks on public buildings.

“We are not talking about a nice, friendly demonstration,” he said. “We are ready for tomorrow. We will be extremely vigilant, extremely firm, and we will let absolutely nothing pass.”

With ongoing protests in France, combined with the scheduled NFL game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and New Orleans Saints in Paris, a Ligue 1 match between Paris Saint-Germain and Lyon was rescheduled from Sunday to Monday night.

The move was requested by local police, citing security concerns and resources that will be stretched thin over the weekend. Police have been dealing with unrest after some high-profile PSG matches, with PSG and Lyon currently tied on points atop the league standings.

Ligue 1 released a statement confirming that the police request to change the date of the game was made official.

The switch to Monday puts the match in direct competition to the Ballon d’Or ceremony in London and could prevent nominated PSG players from attending.

The NFL will close its Paris pop-up shop on Saturday because of planned demonstrations in the French capital ahead of this weekend’s regular-season game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and New Orleans Saints, the league said on Friday.

The store on Rue Saint-Merri had been operating as part of events surrounding Sunday’s game at the Stade de France, the first NFL regular-season contest to be held in France.

“The NFL Shop on Rue Saint-Merri will be closed tomorrow Saturday 24 October, due to potential accessibility issues,” the league said in a statement.

The street is located in Paris’ fourth arrondissement, in the city centre.

The league said the shop would remain open until 8 p.m. local time on Friday and that an alternative NFL pop-up store would operate at the Stade deFrance on Saturday.

Storm Austen cut power to nearly 300,000 French homes and disrupted train and plane services with heavy winds and rain on Friday.

A low-pressure front brought 111 mph (179 kph) winds and rains across Europe overnight with towns facing power outages as trees and debris littered roads, ⁠causing traffic issues, airport and train ​delays ⁠and reduced access to bridges.

Utility Enedis said in a situation update on Friday that nearly 300,000 clients ⁠had no electricity from the storm, with most of disruptions ​located ⁠in Brittany on the ‌western coast and Normandy in the north.

Major disruptions were expected on the ‌Paris commuter rail services, while all rail traffic was suspended in Normandy, French transport minister Philippe Tabarot said in a post on X.

Far-left party La France insoumise condemns the government’s actions to ban protests as an “authoritarian headlong rush”.

The party, whose de facto leader is presidential contender Jean-Luc Mélenchon, called on the French to march “peacefully”,

“Civil liberties cannot be a bargaining chip for an executive branch in crisis,” the party said.

A man has been arrested in France after a 19th century city hall was burned down during a weekend of mass unrest across the nation, according to French media.

The suspect, 40, is reportedly linked to a far-left movement and known for acts of violence against public officials and deemed a potential threat to national security, according to FranceInfo.

France’s justice minister Gerald Darmanin said on Thursday that 2,700 people have been taken into police custody since Saturday in connection with riots and looting, as authorities respond to the ongoing unrest in France.

“There have been 2,700 people taken into police custody since Saturday in connection with these riots and looting,” Darmanin said in an interview with French news channel LCI.

More than a dozen people were injured in violent clashes between rioters and police in northern Spain after anti-fascist protests spiralled out of control, in the latest instance of civil unrest sweeping Europe.

Some 5,000 people gathered at a square in A Coruña, a port city in Galicia, on Wednesday morning to protest the visit of politician Santiago Abascal, the president of Spain’s far-right populist Vox party.

Tensions exploded towards the end of Abascal’s speech in the Plaza de María Pita as protesters threw eggs and police repeatedly charged in a bid to disperse the activists, some of whom threw stones and chairs back.

The mayor of Marseille, Benoît Payan, has called on the French government to roll out support for shopkeepers ahead of another weekend of anticipated unrest.

“I don’t want this to happen again on Saturday,” he said, after rioting and vandalism last week cost the city an estimated 28m euros in damages.

“I want a police presence that will prevent businesses from being vandalized,” he went on, adding that the state should pay “every last cent” to affected businesses.

“I demand to be reimbursed for what we have spent.”