Yannick Delpech says he is considering restaurant’s future after two fires in two weeks

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

A Michelin-starred chef who denounced the violence on the fringes of France’s gilets jaunes protests has been targeted by arsonists twice in two weeks.

Yannick Delpech, 43, who in 2000 became the youngest French chef to win a Michelin star, said the latest fire was started outside the kitchens of L’Amphitryon restaurant while three employees were working inside.

“I am in total shock. Today my thoughts turn to the safety of my staff, my clients and myself. In the coming hours I will make a decision about my restaurant’s future,” Delpech said in a statement.

Anti-government street protests have convulsed France for three months. In late November and early December, riots broke out during successive protests in Paris, with people defacing monuments, torching cars and ransacking private property, marking the worst unrest seen in the capital in decades.

Violent clashes with police, largely blamed by officials on hard-left and -right militants, persist at the weekly demonstrations in the capital and other cities, including Toulouse near where Delpech’s restaurant is located.

In January the chef wrote on Facebook that he would never cower before a minority who sought only chaos. “I will never be held hostage by conspiracy plotters, anarchists, racists who hijack a social movement.”

Just who are the gilets jaunes? Read more

Days later, vandals graffitied “collabo” – slang for collaborator – and another slogan along with “GJ”, for gilets jaunes, on his restaurant. Soon afterwards, arsonists struck for the first time.

An associate of Delpech said: “He didn’t accuse the yellow vests of causing the first fire and makes no link between the two blazes. What he criticised was the violence of thugs on the movement’s fringes.”

Delpech rebuilt his business after a fire in 2011 gutted his restaurant, where the seven-course menu includes champagne and oysters, roasted lobster and suckling veal with black truffle.