www.breitbart.com/news/2005/11/04/D8DLRF301.html
By JAMEY KEATEN Associated Press Writer LE BLANC MESNIL, France Small, mobile groups of youths hit Paris' riot-shaken suburbs with waves of arson attacks, torching hundreds of cars, as unrest entered its secon d week Friday and spread to other towns in France. A woman on crutches was doused in flammable liquid and set on fire earlie r this week as she tried to get off a bus in a Paris suburb, a judicial official said Friday. In the eastern city of Dijon, teens apparently angered by a police crackd own on drug trafficking in their neighborhood set fire to five cars, sai d Paul Ronciere, the region's top government official. Another 11 cars were burned at a housing project in Salon-de-Provence, ne ar the southern city of Marseille, police said. Overnight in the Paris region, at least 520 cars were set ablaze, up from previous nights, the Interior Ministry said. It said five police were s lightly injured by thrown stones or bottles. But unlike previous nights, there were few direct clashes with security f orces, no live bullets fired at police, and far fewer large groups of ri oters, said Jean-Francois Cordet, the top government official for the wo rst-hit Seine-Saint-Denis suburb northeast of Paris. Instead, he said, the unrest was led by "very numerous small and highly m obile groups," with arson attacks that destroyed 187 vehicles and five b uildings, including three sprawling warehouses. "The peak is now behind us," said Gerard Gaudron, mayor of Aulnay- sous-B ois, another badly hit town. He told France-Info radio that parents were determined to keep teenagers home to prevent unrest. In the northeast suburb of Sevran on Wednesday, youths doused a woman on crutches with flammable liquid and set her on fire with a burning rag as she struggled to get off a bus, a judicial official said, citing the bu s driver's report to police. The driver, who had ordered passengers to l eave the bus because flaming objects were blocking the road, helped the injured woman get off, the official said. Justice Minister Pascal Clement deplored the incident Friday, saying it c aused him "great emotion." They were electro cuted in a power substation where they hid, thinking police were chasing them. Traore's brother, Siyakah Traore, on Friday urged protesters to "calm dow n and stop ransacking everything." "This is not how we are going to have our voices heard," he said on RTL r adio. Car torchings are a daily fact of life in France's tough suburbs, with th ousands burned each month, police say. Police intelligence has recorded nearly 70,000 incidents of urban violence this year, including attacks o n police and rescue services, arson, throwing projectiles, clashes betwe en gangs, joy-riding and property destruction, Le Monde reported. What sets this unrest apart is its duration, intensity and the way it rap idly grew beyond the original flashpoint of Clichy-sous-Bois in northeas t Paris to become a broader challenge for France. No urban violence of t his nature has lasted this long, said Pascal Perrineau, director of the Center for the Study of French Political Life. Many of the riotous youths are the French-born children of immigrant pare nts. The unrest has laid bare discontent simmering in suburbs and among immigrant families who feel trapped by poverty, unemployment, and poor e ducation. France's Muslim population, estimated at 5 million, is Western Europe's l argest. Immigrants and their children often complain of police harassmen t and job discrimination. National police spokesman Patrick Hamon, however, said there was "nothing that allows us to say that Islamists" were behind the recent unrest. Some 1,300 riot police fanned out overnight across Seine-Saint-Denis, as the unrest entered its second week and followed Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin's vow Thursday to restore order. A commuter train line linking Paris to Charles de Gaulle airport northeas t of the capital ran a scaled-back service Friday after two trains were targeted Wednesday night. The SNCF train authority said one in five trai ns was running and conductors of night trains were demanding onboard sec urity. Youths fired buckshot at riot police vehicles in Neuilly-sur-Marne, east of Paris, and a group of 30 to 40 harassed police near a synagogue in St ains to the north where a city bus was torched and a school classroom pa rtially burned, Cordet said. But the unrest was sc aled back from the sometimes-ferocious rioting of previous nights, when bullets were fired at police and firefighters without causing injuries.
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