Posted on 11/04/2005 5:57:48 PM PST by blam
Rioters' parents to march against Paris anarchy
By Henry Samuel in Aulnay-sous-Bois
(Filed: 05/11/2005)
Parents of the teenage rioters who have turned the housing estates of northern Paris into an urban war zone will march in silent protest this morning to demand an end to the spiralling unrest.
Firefighters attempt to extinguish a warehouse fire
As the estate dwellers and the police sent in numbers to contain the violence braced for a ninth consecutive night of anarchy, the mayor of one of the worst-hit towns sought to rally residents against the crimes of their children.
Gerard Gaudron, the mayor of Aulnay-sous-Bois, 10 miles north-east of the capital, said he believed an appeal to people's republican spirit could halt the petrol bombing and clashes with riot police that is spreading across France.
"People have had enough," said Mr Gaudron. "People are afraid. It's time for this to stop." He said that parents, most of whom are poor immigrants, were determined to bring an end to the anarchy.
He appealed for them to keep their offspring at home. But that may not be easy.
Like many residents of La Cité des 3,000 - a sprawling project of battered apartment blocks in Aulnay - Madjid Zidane, 47, is exasperated by the nightly battles.
"The troublemakers are not men," he said. "Real men wouldn't behave in this way. No, these are kids under 25 - including my own."
The Algerian father-of-six surveyed a burnt-out police station at the estate entrance.
"The station was only cosmetic anyway," he said. "The police have no power against the kids around here. My 14-year-old pulled a knife on me the other day. Do you think he's afraid of them?"
More than 500 vehicles were burnt in Paris on Thursday night. Dozens more were torched in Dijon, Marseille and Rouen.
The rioting was started by youths angered over the accidental deaths of Bouna Traore, 15, and Ziad Benna, 17, while hiding from police.
Bouna Traore's brother, Siyakah, yesterday told protesters: "Calm down and stop ransacking everything. This is not how we are going to have our voices heard."
We now know that public housing estates are a terrible mistake. That is why in the US they are being torn down/dynamited wholesale. The program is about ghettoizing the unpleasant, which leads to a culture of dysfunction within the ghetto, and isolation. It isn't rocket science.
Set up a new Maginot Line?
The difference about Paris, is that the inner city neighborhoods temd to be chic, and the hinterlands in some places are not. Queens is the slum, and Manhattan is Beverly Hills.
These problems will all be taken care of when Turkey and other Muslim countries are allowed in the EU and free passage of population is allowed throughout. /sarcasm
Woops! I see a behind the scenes thingie, here...
"The troublemakers are not men," he said. "Real men wouldn't behave in this way. No, these are kids under 25 - including my own."
Just innocent children, really.
And they'll be singing We Rule the World to the tune of We are the World.
"I think he was in Viet Nam. Does anyone know that?"
I heard somewhere, that he was in Cambodia at Christmas.
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