PARIS — President Emmanuel Macron refused on Monday to accept the resignation of Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez, the Élysée said, after a weekend of nationwide protests over the cost of living descended into looting, arson and at least 1,800 arrests.

The presidential office said Macron wanted Nuñez to stay to preserve the chain of command inside the police and security forces, according to Reuters. Macron also asked the minister to draw up new methods for dealing with looters as quickly as possible.

The decision caps the most violent weekend in France since the yellow vest unrest of 2018, and it lands on a government that already had little room to manoeuvre. Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu leads a minority administration, the presidential election is due next spring, and the images of a burning 19th-century city hall in Limoges have become a weapon for Macron's rivals on both the far right and far left.

Nuñez told France Inter that he offered to step down on Sunday, and he acknowledged that police lost control of the situation in several cities, Reuters reported.

The demonstrations on Saturday answered calls from the CGT union, student groups and activists who hoped to revive the yellow vest movement. The Interior Ministry put turnout at about 550,000 people nationwide, including 110,000 in Paris. The CGT said 800,000 marched.

Fuel, energy and food prices have climbed in recent months, and students have blockaded schools since mid-September over what they describe as poor learning conditions. The CGT is demanding higher wages and pensions, lower prices and protection for public services.

The marches started peacefully in most cities. By the afternoon, masked groups had set fires and attacked public buildings, The Associated Press reported. Police said a later phase of the day brought large numbers of people whose only aim was to steal.

In Limoges, a group that the local prefect, Maurice Barate, described as radical troublemakers broke into the city hall while officials, staff and members of the public were inside and deliberately set it alight. The roof collapsed and much of the building was destroyed.

In Marseille, protesters forced their way into the lobby of the city hall and a group damaged a police station. In Lyon, a fire broke out inside a tourist office. Hundreds of shops were looted in Paris, Marseille, Lyon and Bordeaux, according to Nuñez.

Paris police reported 855 arrests in the capital region, and the prosecutor's office said 557 people remained in custody on Sunday. The nationwide tally of 1,800 approached the nearly 2,000 arrests recorded on a single day of yellow vest protests in December 2018.

One person died of a heart attack during the Paris protests, police said, and prosecutors have opened an investigation. In Mulhouse, a 17-year-old girl lost an eye, and in Saint-Étienne a young protester lost a hand, according to the AP. Separate inquiries have been opened into both injuries, and the police use of grenades and other riot-control weapons is under scrutiny.

Macron convened an emergency meeting of senior officials on Sunday and then addressed the nation on television. He spoke of the public's "anger" and "shame" and blamed "unrestrained violence" on "insurrectionist elements from radical far-left groups, joined by numerous criminals".

"Those who sought to bring down the Republic will be held accountable," he said. He told prefects to work with mayors in the coming weeks to protect public buildings and businesses, including by banning protests where necessary, and said looters would have to pay for the damage.

Nuñez wrote on X: "The right to protest is a fundamental right. Deliberately and collectively sowing disorder through violence is not."

On Sunday, hundreds of people returned to the Place de la République in central Paris under a heavy police presence. Officers fired tear gas as small groups tried to set bicycles and bins on fire. Dislodged cobblestones and shattered storefronts littered the square, and the base of its central monument, a statue of Marianne, had been partly dismantled.

Paris Mayor Emmanuel Grégoire wrote in an open letter that "the scale of the damage is considerable and unprecedented". He and the mayors of Marseille and Lyon have asked for a meeting with Lecornu in the coming days.

Lecornu blamed the ultra-left and criminals for the violence. Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the far-left leader who joined Saturday's march in Paris, accused the prime minister of "playing with fire", while saying that people who shared the protesters' cause had no business looting. Marine Le Pen, the far-right leader and presidential hopeful, called the government exhausted and powerless.

The unrest also drew comment from abroad. US President Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social that France was burning and linked the violence to immigration. French authorities have not connected immigrants to the rioting. In Italy, where a related protest in Milan ended with about 50 people detained, Premier Giorgia Meloni said: "Demonstrating is a right. Setting our cities ablaze is not."

Macron has asked Nuñez to take all necessary measures to ensure transparency about what happened over the weekend, and the minister must now bring forward his plan for dealing with looters while prefects decide which demonstrations to ban in the days ahead.