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French police heighten security on riot anniversary
France's interior minister ordered police to go on maximum alert in at-risk areas around the country after several buses were torched in suburbs ahead of the anniversary of widespread rioting last year. "I decided to mobilize all mobile forces at our disposal for the security of those who use public transport,'' Nicolas Sarkozy, a conservative frontrunner in next year's presidential elections, said overnight Thursday.A car was burned and a police officer slightly injured near the home of Xavier Lemoine, the conservative mayor of the town of Montfermeil, near Paris, police said Friday. "The officer was slightly injured when a stone was thrown as he tried to put out a fire after a car was torched in the street where the mayor lives,'' said a police spokesman. Mr Sarkozy spoke after a meeting with transport officials on the eve of the first anniversary of three weeks of violent clashes between armed youths and police in suburbs throughout France, when more than 10,000 cars were set alight and 300 buildings firebombed. Mr Sarkozy said that all "sensitive (bus) lines'' would be protected at crucial times. "We will do everything possible to ensure that public services are not disrupted anywhere in this country,'' he said. He did not give details but said that a meeting would be held Friday with police chiefs and transport companies "to finalize necessary measures''. Mr Sarkozy called for an investigation into what led young people to set fire to buses after drivers who were attacked in the latest violence said that the assailants were very young. The media should also act responsibly in reporting on the anniversary of last year's violence to avert copycat crimes, he said. "We should not give any publicity to people who want nothing else,'' he said. In the runup to the anniversary armed youths had hijacked and set fire to a bus in the suburbs of Paris Thursday while hooded gangs torched two others overnight Wednesday. Around 10 masked men - five of them carrying handguns - forced the driver and passengers off a night bus heading from Bagnolet to Montreuil, on the eastern edge of the capital, at around 1:00 am on Thursday morning. Earlier, hooded youths had set fire to a bus in the western suburb of Nanterre, not far from the La Defense business district, leaving passengers scrambling to escape, firemen and police said. A dozen youths boarded the bus, threw an inflammable liquid inside, lit it and fled. A third attack took place in Athis-Mons south of Paris, where police said three masked youths ordered passengers off a bus, hurled a Molotov cocktail inside and fled. The driver managed to put out the flames. Outside Paris, in a suburb of the central-eastern city of Lyon, a bus was also torched by vandals as it was parked in a depot. Police have warned of an increase in tensions in recent weeks. Officers have on several occasions been the targets of ambushes in the Paris suburbs. The spark for last year's rioting was the accidental deaths of two local teenagers in the run-down Paris suburb of Clichy-sous-Bois, who were electrocuted while hiding from the police. Town residents are to hold a silent march in tribute to the two boys on Friday, before unveiling a monument in their memory. Later Friday, the town has planned an evening of concerts, films and debates. Posted by: ryuge 2006-10-27 |
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