Cost-of-living march in Italy’s financial capital descends into chaos for a second day, with hundreds detained, mostly young people, as Prime Minister Meloni calls security summit.
Police in Milan fired tear gas and deployed water cannons over the weekend as cost-of-living protests organised by the Italia in Piazza movement spiralled into street clashes, widespread property damage and looting in the city’s historic centre.
What began as a sanctioned demonstration against rising prices, fuel costs, tax pressures and declining public services on Saturday, 17 October, turned confrontational near Piazza del Duomo. Masked groups broke away from the main march, throwing stones, paving blocks, bottles, firecrackers and barriers at officers. Barricades were built from outdoor café tables and set alight. A Carabinieri vehicle was severely damaged and looted.
Milan Stores Looted as Protests Turn Violent:
Shops along Corso Vittorio Emanuele, Via Torino and near Piazza Cordusio and San Babila were targeted. Windows were smashed at stores including Footlocker, Nike, Levi’s, Under Armour and the Rinascente department store. A Carrefour supermarket was entered and looted, with protesters emerging carrying bottles of alcohol and scattering food. Rubbish bins, scooters, bicycles and outdoor seating were overturned or destroyed. Tourists fled the area, shops pulled down shutters, and the Duomo metro station was closed.
Clashes continued on Sunday. Hundreds of mostly black-clad, hooded young people, many of them minors, gathered again around Piazza del Duomo and Via Torino. They smashed more windows, ransacked stores and set bins alight before police moved in with tear gas and water cannon. By Sunday evening more than 200 people had been detained in Milan alone, with around 80 percent reported to be minors. Earlier figures from Saturday put arrests in the city in the dozens, with additional detentions in Turin, Bologna and other northern cities. Police and some protesters sustained injuries; reports varied on exact numbers but confirmed officers were among those hurt.
Italian media and officials described the violence as the work of a minority of aggressive youths rather than the bulk of the original marchers. Some accounts noted Palestinian flags and keffiyeh scarves among Saturday’s demonstrators, reflecting broader anti-war themes that accompanied the cost-of-living demands. Retail association Confcommercio estimated damages to shops and businesses in the hundreds of thousands of euros.
Meloni Condemns Violence as Italy Faces Protests:
Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni condemned the unrest. “Demonstrating is a right. Setting our cities ablaze is not,” she said, accusing “hooligans” of exploiting legitimate protests to create chaos. She called a government security meeting for Monday to discuss further measures. Milan Mayor Giuseppe Sala, while acknowledging that the reasons for the protests were “understandable,” said the violence against police and damage to the city could not be justified. He described seeing “smashed shop windows, looted stores, and frightened citizens.”
The unrest in Milan formed part of a wider wave of discontent across northern Italy and echoed simultaneous large-scale protests in France over living costs and public services. Organisers of the Italia in Piazza actions had called for national mobilisation against economic pressures felt by many households. Turnout estimates for the initial Milan march ran to several thousand, with smaller numbers in other cities.
As order was restored by late Sunday, the focus shifted to the political and social fallout. Authorities face questions over how relatively small groups of predominantly young people were able to cause such disruption in one of Europe’s major commercial centres, while the underlying grievances over the cost of living remain unresolved.