Posted on 11/09/2005 3:52:48 AM PST by kcvl
By D'ARCY DORAN, Associated Press Writer 1 minute ago
PARIS - Rioters defied a state of emergency that took effect Wednesday, as they looted and burned two superstores, set fire to a newspaper office and paralyzed France's second-largest city's subway system with a firebomb.
However, the number of car burnings — a barometer for the unrest — dropped sharply, suggesting the movement lost steam. Overnight Tuesday to Wednesday, youths torched 617 vehicles, down from 1,173 the previous night, national police spokesman Patrick Hamon said. Incidents were reported in 116 towns, down from 226 the night before.
President Jacques Chirac announced extraordinary security measures, which began Wednesday and are valid for a 12-day state of emergency, clearing the way for curfews after nearly two weeks of rioting that began in neglected and impoverished suburban neighborhoods with large Muslim communities.
The French capital and its suburbs, as well as more than 30 other cities, were covered by the state-of-emergency decree, according to a government bulletin published Wednesday. It empowers officials to put troublemakers under house arrest, ban or limit the movement of people and vehicles, confiscate weapons and close public spaces where gangs gather.
Towns included on the list stretched from Nice on the Mediterranean to Strasbourg on the German border and Le Havre on the English Channel, giving an indication of how widespread the unrest has become.
The mayhem sweeping the neglected and impoverished neighborhoods with large African and Arab communities is forcing France to confront anger building for decades among residents who complain of discrimination and unemployment.
In overnight violence, officials were forced to shut down the southern city of Lyon's subway system after a firebomb exploded in a station late Tuesday, a regional government spokesman said. No one was hurt. Transport officials were to decide Wednesday morning when service could resume, the spokesman said.
Arsonists also set fire to the Nice-Matin newspaper's office in Grasse in the southeast Alpes-Maritimes region, national police spokesman Patrick Reydy said.
Youths threw gasoline bombs at police who retaliated with tear gas in the southern city of Toulouse, where Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy was visiting, LCI television said.
"None of us has a choice," Sarkozy told police and fire department representatives in Toulouse. "We have to succeed. We will not budge a centimeter."
Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin said riot police faced "determined individuals, structured gangs, organized criminality." Police say rioters have been using mobile phone text messages and the Internet to organize arson attacks.
Villepin, tacitly acknowledging that France has failed to live up to its egalitarian ideals, said discrimination was a "daily and repeated" reality.
French regional officials were preparing to use the state-of-emergency powers to impose curfews. The Interior Ministry said there was no centralized list of towns and cities that would be affected, because curfew measures were being drawn up locally.
The northern French city of Amiens, the central city of Orleans and Savigny-sur-Orge, and the Essonne region south of Paris said they planned curfews for minors, who must be accompanied by adults at night. Despite the curfew, two cars were burned in Amiens, police said. Six cars were burned there a night earlier.
Curfew violators face up to two months in jail and a $4,400 fine, the Justice Ministry said. Minors face one month in jail.
The 50-year-old state-of-emergency law was drawn up to quell unrest in Algeria during its war of independence from France, and was last used in December 1984 by the Socialist government of President Francois Mitterrand against rioting in the French Pacific Ocean territory of New Caledonia.
The violence started Oct. 27 as a localized riot in a northeast Paris suburb angry over the accidental deaths of two teenagers, of Mauritanian and Tunisian descent, electrocuted while hiding from police in a power substation.
It has grown into a nationwide insurrection by disillusioned suburban youths, many of them French-born children of immigrants from France's former territories like Algeria. France's suburbs have long been neglected, and their youth complain of a lack of jobs and widespread discrimination.
French historians say the rioting is more widespread and more destructive in material terms than the May riots of 1968, when university students erected barricades in Paris' Latin Quarter and across France, throwing paving stones at police. That unrest, a turning point in modern France, led to a general strike by 10 million workers and forced President Gen. Charles de Gaulle to dissolve parliament and fire Premier Georges Pompidou.
___
Associated Press writers John Leicester, Christine Ollivier, Jamey Keaten and Angela Doland contributed to this report.
They are using burned cars as a barometer. ROFLMAO BUMP!!
Almost forgot. Religion of peace my arse!
I heard on Larry Elder France has about 60-80 cars torched per day before this sustained riot. 29,000 last year. France has been tap dancing around the problem.
DK
And our MSM is comparing THIS to our race-riots in the 60's.
The rioters should publicly announce a plan to march on EuroDisney and burn it down..2/3's of the country would probably support them..
Protestants no doubt.
"What the heck kind of logic is that? They try to blow up a subway but because fewer cars were burned it's getting better. :()"
1. Consider the source.
and
2. There are not that many cars left to burn.
Good Lord, don't give 'em any ideas! They might do it!
( On the other hand, I hear EuroDisney has never turned a profit- they might welcome the excuse to withdraw. )
"Why Isnt the UN Going In to Help!!!!"
First they have to call a meeting and agree what year to meet.
Then, should they pass a resolution to help France, we can veto it like France did to us concerning the Iraq war.
sounds like maybe they just ran out of cars to torch
Running out of cars in those areas, perhaps? Who would even drive through let alone park where these dog-bait live?
Oh, the humanity! First they were warned, then they were given curfews, and now... now there's a state of emergency!!!
I watched Le Journal on cable last night, I guess some are as cynical towards the press/media as we are...a Parisian woman believed the media was probably exaggerating what was happening. Other native french were more nervous looking.
"Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin said riot police faced 'determined individuals, structured gangs, organized criminality'"...but Villepain--in the characteristic hubris and denial that have fatally flawed his judgment and made him a dangerous mis-leader of the people--refused to acknowledge that these "determined individuals, structured gangs, and organized" criminals are Muslims, whose agenda is jihad and includes neither integration into French society nor adoption of French--rather than Islamic--viewpoints.
"Villepin, tacitly acknowledging that France has failed to live up to its egalitarian ideals, said discrimination was a 'daily and repeated' reality"...but Villepin failed to acknowledge that Muslim egalitarian ideals are quite different from French, inasmuch as French ideals insist upon liberty, equality, and fraternity for all people, whereas Muslims ideals insist upon equality and fraternity for all believers; dhimmitude, slavery, and/or death for all non-believers; and liberty only inasmuch as it conforms to the koran and the shariah.
This is an enormous difference that Villepin, and others who are blinded by denial, refuse to accept, and, until they acknowledge and face this unpleasant reality, they will continue to administer the incorrect treatment for a very serious political and social illness, and matters will continue to get worse.
"The violence...has grown into a nationwide insurrection..."...and unless the truth of its basic cause is recognized, acknowledged, and faced with ruthless honesty, effective remedial action can not be taken.
This is the reason why those blinded by hubris and denial such as Chirac, Villepin, Schroeder, Neville Chaimberlain, and a host of American Leftist/Democrat politicians, "activists", "celebrities", "academicians", and so-called "journalists", are not only ineffectual leaders but are, in fact, dangerously blundering fools.
The people of France, of Europe, of America, in fact, of the entire world will pay a heavy price for choosing such dangerously blundering fools for their leaders and following their dangerously blundering foolishness.
"It empowers officials to put troublemakers under house arrest, ban or limit the movement of people and vehicles, confiscate weapons and close public spaces where gangs gather."
"empowers" my foot. That's no show of force to end this thing. If this thing dies of its own accord, it will just show the muslims what they wanted to know when they ran this little test. That France will do nothing. Better watch out next time. It will be much more organized and successful and I'll bet they use weapons.
Betrayal.
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