France slaps curfew to stem riots

PARIS – The French government yesterday approved giving curfew powers to regional authorities to stem the worst urban violence the country has seen in nearly four decades, Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy said after a cabinet meeting.

The decision – taken at a cabinet meeting chaired by President Jacques Chirac – would define the areas where the powers would be applied, according to officials. The measure will also allow police to carry out raids when they suspect weapons are being stored in the poor city suburbs that have been at the centre of the unrest, Sarkozy said.”We will watch how events develop to see how it might be applied in a targeted way on an area of the country,” he said, stressing that it was a sign of the government’s “firmness, coolness and level-headedness”.The interior minister was to meet top regional authorities later yesterday to discuss how the decision would be implemented.Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin told national television late on Monday that the curfew powers would be invoked under a 50-year-old law first brought in as an unsuccessful attempt to quell an insurrection in Algeria, at a time when the north African country was a French colony.Villepin said authorities would be able to impose them in areas “where necessary” to restrict the movement of people and vehicles and to set up perimeters around certain troublespots.He also said that 1 500 police and gendarme reservists would be deployed as reinforcements for 8 000 officers already on the ground, but ruled out any army intervention.A town mayor near the epicentre of the riots, in the northeastern Paris suburb of Raincy, already imposed a municipal curfew from Monday to “avoid a tragedy”.Suburban youths quoted by Le Parisien newspaper said the emergency measures “won’t change anything”.”This isn’t going to solve things,” one said.”More repression means more destruction…more cops is just provocation.”The government’s decision followed an escalation of rioting and violence that have spread to much of France since they first erupted October 27 in a tough neighbourhood north of Paris.Overnight Sunday, police reported 330 arrests and said youths burned 1 173 vehicles overnight.Twelve officers were slightly injured and some reported being fired at, but not hit, with buckshot.That toll was slightly reduced from the weekend, when rampages took place around some 300 cities and towns.The unrest, the worst the country has experienced since student revolts in 1968, has prompted several countries – including Australia, Britain, Germany, Japan and the United States – to issue warnings to its citizens about travel within France.The escalating violence claimed its first life on Monday as a 61-year-old man, who was beaten into a coma by a hooded assailant outside of his home north of Paris last Friday, died in hospital.- Nampa-AFPThe measure will also allow police to carry out raids when they suspect weapons are being stored in the poor city suburbs that have been at the centre of the unrest, Sarkozy said.”We will watch how events develop to see how it might be applied in a targeted way on an area of the country,” he said, stressing that it was a sign of the government’s “firmness, coolness and level-headedness”.The interior minister was to meet top regional authorities later yesterday to discuss how the decision would be implemented.Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin told national television late on Monday that the curfew powers would be invoked under a 50-year-old law first brought in as an unsuccessful attempt to quell an insurrection in Algeria, at a time when the north African country was a French colony.Villepin said authorities would be able to impose them in areas “where necessary” to restrict the movement of people and vehicles and to set up perimeters around certain troublespots.He also said that 1 500 police and gendarme reservists would be deployed as reinforcements for 8 000 officers already on the ground, but ruled out any army intervention.A town mayor near the epicentre of the riots, in the northeastern Paris suburb of Raincy, already imposed a municipal curfew from Monday to “avoid a tragedy”.Suburban youths quoted by Le Parisien newspaper said the emergency measures “won’t change anything”.”This isn’t going to solve things,” one said.”More repression means more destruction…more cops is just provocation.”The government’s decision followed an escalation of rioting and violence that have spread to much of France since they first erupted October 27 in a tough neighbourhood north of Paris.Overnight Sunday, police reported 330 arrests and said youths burned 1 173 vehicles overnight.Twelve officers were slightly injured and some reported being fired at, but not hit, with buckshot.That toll was slightly reduced from the weekend, when rampages took place around some 300 cities and towns.The unrest, the worst the country has experienced since student revolts in 1968, has prompted several countries – including Australia, Britain, Germany, Japan and the United States – to issue warnings to its citizens about travel within France.The escalating violence claimed its first life on Monday as a 61-year-old man, who was beaten into a coma by a hooded assailant outside of his home north of Paris last Friday, died in hospital.- Nampa-AFP