Criminals,  Politics

France Riot Watch: France Invokes Emergency Powers

A man looks at vehicles that were set ablaze in Outreau, northern France.

Reuters has France invokes emergency powers

France imposed emergency measures on Wednesday in 38 suburbs, towns and cities including Paris and police said a wave of riots was waning despite a 13th straight night of firebombs and torched cars.

Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin published a decree invoking a 50-year-old law that gives regional government officials the power to impose nightly curfews against the rioters, mainly protesting against unemployment and racism.

A poll in Le Parisien newspaper showed 73 percent support for the measures, with 86 percent of those surveyed expressing outrage at violence which police said had destroyed another 617 vehicles overnight, about half the number of the night before.

“We are seeing a sharp drop in hostile acts,” the national police director, Michel Gaudin, told a news briefing.

The intense and sustained rioting may be on the wane but the structural societal and governmental problems will remain.

France will need to not simply ignore their immigrant Muslim communitites and must begin to assimilate them into their culture.