French cities woke up yesterday to damaged community centres, schools and city halls - places that symbolise the French institutions and state.

This morning, shopkeepers will be tallying up the damage of a night that saw rioters take aim at shops and supermarkets across the country.

French media report that in Paris, the looting focused on the central shopping street of Rue de Rivoli.

More than a dozen people were later found carrying stolen shoes, bags and clothes and arrested, Le Parisien says. Small corner shops and jewellery stores were also broken into.

In the suburbs of the capital, supermarkets such as Carrefour were broken into.

In Roubaix, near the Belgian border, looters targeted a mini supermarket before setting fire to it.

In Marseille, shops and cafes were targeted too. The owner of a small restaurant in the southern city told BFMTV: "I am so sorry for the young man who died, but I don't understand what my business has to do with it."

And in Nantes, people reportedly drove a car into a Lidl supermarket before looting it.