Chaos is taking over France, as shown by a third night of revolt, much more serious than the previous ones, with the multiplication of fires and especially looting throughout the country.
The 40,000 police and gendarmes deployed, including elite units, have been unable to control so much violence in such a vast geographical area. They have been able to protect very sensitive public buildings, but it has been impossible to prevent looting because businesses are much more vulnerable. The feeling is helpless. In total, 667 people have been arrested. 249 police officers have been injured
Given the seriousness of the situation, President Emmanuel Macron, who is in Brussels for a European Council, will return to Paris early to participate in a new crisis meeting at the Élysée. The French media speak insistently of the possibility of decreeing a state of emergency to quell what is already an insurrection.
The acts of vandalism, committed by groups of young people between the ages of 14 and 18, affected many cities. One of the most serious was the burning of 12 buses, which were completely burned, in a parking lot belonging to the Paris urban transport company (RATP), in Aubervilliers, a suburb on the northern periphery. In Roubaix, near the Belgian border, several buildings burned. In the center of Paris, a Nike store and a Zara store were looted. Material damage is counted in many millions of euros. The list of affected cities is long: Marseille, Lille, Besançon, Pau, Montauban, Rennes, Toulouse.
The riots on Thursday night were added to those on Wednesday, in which, in addition to vehicles, individuals and the police, a court, police stations, city halls, schools, supermarkets, urban buses and a tram were attacked. There was even an attempted assault on the Fresnes prison, in the Val-de-Marne, to free detainees.
The young protagonists of all these events used, as usual, high-powered fireworks to confront the police and set fires. In Villerbaune, on the outskirts of Lyon, an apartment building that had caught fire had to be evacuated. Several neighbors had to be treated for poisoning.
The young Nahel died of a shot to the chest when he was driving a rented yellow Mercedes, with a Polish license plate, and tried to escape at a checkpoint. Yesterday the prosecutor of the Republic of Nanterre, Pascal Prache, gave more details. The policeman who fired the shot went to court and was later formally incriminated and sent to pretrial detention, as requested by the prosecution, considering that he could have committed “voluntary homicide” by exceeding the alleged self-defense put forward. Jail for the agent has apparently not calmed the spirits of those who protest. Social anger has degenerated into vandalism and looting.
Prache reported that the agents on a motorcycle chased the vehicle, in which two other occupants were traveling in addition to the victim, for a time through the streets of Nanterre. The driver did not respect a first control and later started the car when they stopped him again. Nahel had a record for a similar case. No weapons or drugs were found in the vehicle.
The Nanterre drama has reopened the controversy over the effects of a law, approved in 2017, which allows the police to fire at a vehicle that does not respect a checkpoint, whenever the lives of the officers or other people are in danger. The problem is that threat perception is subjective and abuses have occurred.
What is happening is an explosion of uncontrolled anger among young people of immigrant origin, a phenomenon very similar to the one that occurred in 2005 during the presidency of Jacques Chirac. For Macron, it is a new public order crisis after those that occurred during the revolt of the yellow vests and during the demonstrations against the pension reform.
