French President Emmanuel Macron has bailed on a riot-wrecked Paris in favour of beginning a three-day tour of the Middle East, news outlets in the country have confirmed.
Macron had been expected to announce that he was abandoning the tour during a speech at 8 pm local time on Sunday, addressing the worsening street violence taking place across France.
However, he confirmed that he still intended to leave his country in favour of visiting Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Qatar, leaving other members of his cabinet to deal with the aftermath.
“I’ve taken a number of initiatives on an international level in order to ensure that we have fuel and gas and will continue to do so by visiting the Gulf countries in order to secure our supply,” he said in an effort to justify the trip.
Some in the French president’s cabinet do not appear keen to deal with the aftermath of last weekend’s violence. According to Le Monde, the country’s interior minister, Laurent Nuñez, attempted to hand in his resignation on Sunday night.
However, the attempt to resign was reportedly refused by Macron, with Nuñez instead being ordered to “put in place new operational methods for security forces” in the hopes of handling expected future violence.
“The interior minister submitted his resignation to the president on Sunday,” a government representative later confirmed on Monday.
“Given the necessity for continued leadership of law enforcement at this time, the president refused.”
Macron’s decision not to cancel the trip has upset a section of the French public, with even some left-wing officials accusing the president of trying to escape his problems.
“No response to the demands of the people and its youth. And on top of that, he announces he’s leaving the country tomorrow for the Middle East,” French hard-left MEP Anthony Smith said on social media.
“Macron is deliberately letting the situation fester. Utterly irresponsible.”
French Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu has meanwhile called for local officials to impose curfews on citizens where rioting has become difficult to counter.
Details on the measure, he said, would be given later on Monday.