Posted on 11/09/2005 12:18:07 AM PST by Crackingham
The French government yesterday pinned its hopes of ending nearly two weeks of rioting on a range of sweeping emergency powers allowing for curfews, house arrest and police raids without warrants. President Jacques Chirac, who has been accused of indecision and lack of leadership, invoked a 50-year-old law dating from the Algerian war of independence in his belated gamble on a tough response to the unrest.
The emergency powers authorised in a crisis session of the cabinet took effect at midnight and were available to local officials to impose on the estates of Paris and provincial towns and cities where violence has flared.
In Amiens, the first city to make use of the powers, officials announced a curfew banning unaccompanied under 16-year-olds from the streets between 10pm and 6am. Orleans and Savigny-sur-Orge followed suit.
Opponents of the government reacted angrily, claiming that the initiative sent a "message of war" to young people in poor suburbs. But ministers and public opinion had been shocked by 12 successive nights of disorder, spreading from Parisian suburbs to almost every region. Nearly 6,000 vehicles had already been set on fire by the time Mr Chirac sat down with his cabinet.
One man has died, scores of police officers and rescue workers have been hurt and police have made more than 1,500 arrests, including children as young as 11. Police said yesterday that 1,173 vehicles had been destroyed in overnight arson attacks. Although the total was 200 down on the worst night of rioting so far, Sunday, the reduction was hardly enough to suggest that the trouble was about to end.
Last night trouble broke out when youths threw petrol bombs at police and set cars ablaze in Toulouse. It happened just as Nicolas Sarkozy, the interior minister and a hated figure among many immigrant families after calling troublemakers "scum", was due to meet police in the city. He said that the use of the emergency law reflected the government's resolve to act with firmness.
Under the emergency powers, meetings can be banned, suspects can be excluded from defined areas and house arrest warrants can be ordered against anyone considered a threat to public order.
Fiddle frog, fiddle.
Monsieurs Maximilien Robespierre, Georges Jacques Danton, and Jean Paul Marat please pick up the white courtesy phone.
Wait a second...what does France normally do during war?
Oh yeah...surrender.
Right then...carry on, yonder terrorists. You have nothing to fear.
A message of war? My, that's a terrible idea. Might bruise the lads' egoes or rough their youthful dispositions. Or even darken their crisp judgement with clouds of violence!!
Really, the French have lost all semblence of humanity. The vicious cuthroats! [/sarcasm]
This was about a week and half overdo. At the very least.
They gotta get rid of that Arch du Triumph thingy...some stranger is too often marching through it...gold ring of European conquest. Bad luck. A curse. An invitation. "kick me".
They need to bring out the hoses, guns in a show of force. They only respect POWER.
Un-freaking-believeable:
"In Amiens, the first city to make use of the powers, officials announced a curfew banning unaccompanied under 16-year-olds from the streets between 10pm and 6am..."
That'll do it. Trouble's over now. Good thing they're really cracking down.
the only message that will make any real impression on the wildling hooligan muslim punks doing this stuff comes in caliber 7.62 NATO....
For France, the good news is that the numbers of cars being burned is down so far tonight (13th official night of violence and burning).
But their bad news is, among other things, that the "youths" have managed to firebomb and shut down the subway in Lyons tonight.
And even with this reduced level of violence, there are still many, many times more cars being firebombed in France than in Iraq and Afghanistan combined.
And the schools, and the warehouses, and the car dealerships, and a couple of churches, and stores (which were looted), and one place I read they have firebombed homes. And a police station or so.
It's freaking insanity. And the "youths". You read of those sentenced, 108 (or was it 103?) were adults, 33 were minors.
I guess I'm a "youth", too. Does that mean I'm not responsible for my actions? I mean, I've not been hired when I should have been, I'm poor, live in what would be considered by many to be substandard housing, and many people don't like me.
"Monsieurs Maximilien Robespierre, Georges Jacques Danton, and Jean Paul Marat please pick up the white courtesy phone."
Whew. That would be a sight. La Vendee one more time.
Nuke Mecca from orbit
It's the only way to be sure.
I wonder how the liberals in the US who keep screaming the danger of Patriot Act would react to this law being invoked.
Interesting that this law must be invoked at the national level before a local official such as a mayor can do something as simple as impose a curfew. Yet another problem with centralization of power. In the USA, mayors & governors would have been doing this & other things on their own and no riot would have lasted for two weeks.
The French also change sides during war.
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