Apple closed a large number of its retail stores in the US over the weekend following widespread arson and looting in many cities around the country. The company has now extended the closures at least through Monday as the situation continues to remain tense across the nation.
Apple had earlier announced that it was taking the decision to shut down some of its stores to ensure the safety of its employees. “With the health and safety of our teams in mind, we’ve made the decision to keep a number of our stores in the US closed on Sunday”, Apple originally said in a press release over the weekend. According to 9to5Mac‘s Michael Steeber, the company will assess the situation day-by-day to decide when it will be safe again to reopen the stores.
Apple had reopened some of its US retail stores just last week following the coronavirus lockdown. According to reports, only 140 out of the 271 Apple Stores in the US were reopened before the violence erupted last week over the brutal murder of George Floyd, an African American man, by a white police officer in the city of Minneapolis, Minnesota.
The agitation, which started peacefully, quickly devolved into rioting, with many troublemakers taking the opportunity to unleash large-scale looting and violence that have since spread to many of the country’s largest cities, including New York, Los Angeles and Washington DC. Reports also suggest that in downtown Los Angeles, rioters breached the construction site where Apple is renovating the Tower Theater. It is, however, unclear as to whether there was damage to the structure.
