A YOUNG MAN has died today after falling from the roof of a store in northwestern France during overnight protests triggered by the police shooting of a teenager, police said.

The man, who is reportedly around 20 years old,  crashed through the roof of a supermarket that prosecutors said had not been the target of any plundering during riots overnight Thursday to Friday, they said.

France has been hit by protests since a teenager called Nahel M. was shot point-blank on Tuesday by police during a traffic stop captured on video that has unleashed rage and reignited debate about police tactics.

“The whole world must see that when we march for Nahel, we march for all those who were not filmed,” activist Assa Traore, whose brother died after being arrested in 2016, told the rally led by the teenager’s mother.

The policeman accused of shooting Nahel in Nanterre was charged with voluntary homicide and remanded in custody, but it remained to be seen what impact that may have on the unrest.

Some 40,000 police were mobilised to try to keep the peace on Thursday, more than four times Wednesday’s numbers on the ground when dozens were arrested.

Today Macron has brought in a curfew on public transport in some parts of the country, and promised that even more police will be deployed. 

FRANCE’S INTERIOR MINISTRY has said that bus and tram services will be halted nationwide at 9pm tonight, and sales of large fireworks banned, in order to quash violent protests sparked by the killing of a teenager by police.

The statement said that regional prefects, who are in charge of security around the country, would also be asked to ban the sale and transport of petrol cans, acids and other inflammable liquids.

Additionally, French police will use armoured vehicles to suppress riots, according to Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne.

“Additional mobile forces” would be deployed along with the vehicles belonging to France’s gendarmerie, Borne said, also announcing the cancellation of “large-scale events binding personnel and potentially posing risks to public order”.