| CLASSIFIED TIMES
| APPOINTMENT TIMES
| THE UAE
| SUBCONTINENT
| EDITORIAL
| SPORTS
| MIDDLE EAST
| THE WORLD
| BUSINESS
| NEWS IN PICS
| UAE IN PICS
| LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
| OPINION
| RAMADAN TIMINGS
| MOHAMMED A. R. GALADARI
| NRIs! Free Calling Card
| NEWSMAKERS
| WEEKEND
| CITY TIMES
| YOUNG TIMES
| WOMEN ONE
| CROSSWORD
| M.J.AKBAR
| PRAFUL BIDWAI
| NOAM CHOMSKY
| HENRY KISSINGER
| JONATHAN POWER
| TOM PLATE
| IRFAN HUSAIN
| ROSS PEAKE
| VIRENDRA PAREKH
| MATEIN KHALID
| GANGADHAR KRISHNA
| FOREX RATES
| WEATHER
| NRI PROBLEMS
| INDIA CLUB
| PAKISTAN CLUB
| PRAYER TIMINGS
| SUBSCRIBE
| ADVERTISE
| WRITE TO US
| ABOUT US

| HOME | SEARCH |  |  |  | Click here for Advanced Search

Khaleej Times Online >> News >> THE WORLD French youths riot again as government approves curfews (Reuters) 8 November 2005 PARIS - Youths rioted across France overnight, torching more than 1,000 vehicles, despite government plans to impose curfews to quell almost two weeks of unrest. The protests, blamed on racism and unemployment, receded in the Paris region after shots were fired at police the previous night but continued unabated in other parts of France in the early hours of Tuesday, the Interior Ministry said. The renewed violence followed a warning by Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin that he would take a firm line against lawbreakers, including reinforcements for police and curfews, not seen in France since the Algerian war of 1954-1962. Villepin’s cabinet met on Tuesday and approved the steps. “Wherever it is necessary, prefects will be able to impose a curfew,” Villepin said, referring to the senior officials responsible for security in departments around the country. A town east of Paris imposed its own curfew on minors on Monday evening and another to the west of the capital organised citizens’ patrols to help the police. Villepin said 1,500 police and gendarmes would be brought in to back up the 8,000 officers already deployed in areas hit by unrest. He also promised to accelerate urban renewal programmes and outlined other plans to help young people in poor suburbs. Mayors of riot-hit towns welcomed the tougher line, but some asked what another measure announced by Villepin -- extended powers for them -- would actually mean in practice. ”Every time they announce more powers for mayors, they cut the funds,” complained Jean-Christophe Lagarde, mayor of the northeastern Paris suburb of Drancy. Elisabeth Guigou, a Socialist deputy from the northeastern Paris suburbs, said that invoking a curfew law passed during the Algerian war was “not the best reference” for fighting unrest among youths mostly of North African Arab and African origin. The left-wing daily Liberation recalled in an editorial that Jacques Chirac was elected president in 1995 after pledging to repair France’s “social fracture”. “Chirac’s reign is a tragic farce,” it wrote. The opposition Socialists said Villepin had not done enough to give hope to those people in areas hit by the unrest, which has involved poor whites as well as French-born citizens of Arab or African origin complaining of racism and unemployment. “Beyond the necessary calls for order, what was missing in the prime minister’s address was a social dimension, a message and precise commitments towards the people of these areas in difficulty,” the Socialist Party said in a statement. Police said 14 cars were set alight in the Yvelines district west of Paris and 17 in Seine-Saint-Denis north of the capital, home to many Arab and African immigrants where the unrest began. Officials in neighbouring Belgium played down the extent of the violence there, although there were also minor incidents of arson in Sint Niklaas in the north and Liege in the east. “There were no riots. These were all very isolated incidents. Whoever set fire to the cars must have been influenced by the footage of what is going on in France,” Brussels fire department spokesman Francis Boileau said.
Print this article |  |  |  | Email this article
Related News
| North Korea sounds cautious note on nuclear talks
| Britain sticks to its guns over terror laws
| Thai PM vows offensive as bombs rattle south
| Man shot in Australian raids on suspected militants
| Man dies of bird flu in Vietnam as global experts meet
Click here More News

Top

© 2005 Khaleej Times All Rights Reserved. |