Sporadic violence, but calmer night in France after the burial of a teenager by a family

By Benoît Van Overstraeten and Horaci Garcia

PARIS (Reuters) – Riots across France appeared less intense on Saturday, as tens of thousands of police were deployed to cities across the country following the funeral of a teenager of North African origin, whose shooting police sparked nationwide unrest.

President Emmanuel Macron postponed a state visit to Germany that was due to begin on Sunday to manage the worst crisis for his leadership since the “Yellow Vest” protests that paralyzed much of France in late 2018.

Some 45,000 police officers were on the streets with specialized elite units, armored vehicles and helicopters coming to reinforce its three largest cities, Paris, Lyon and Marseille.

At 1:45 a.m. (11:45 p.m. GMT) Sunday morning, the situation was calmer than the previous four nights, although there was some tension in central Paris and sporadic clashes in the Mediterranean cities of Marseille, Nice and the eastern city of Strasbourg.

The biggest flashpoint occurred in Marseille, where police fired tear gas and fought street fights with youths around the city center late into the night.

In Paris, police increased security on the iconic Champs-Élysées avenue after a call on social media to gather there. The street, usually crowded with tourists, was lined with police carrying out spot checks. Store fronts were barricaded to prevent possible damage and looting.

The Interior Ministry indicated that 1,311 people had been arrested on Friday evening, compared to 875 the previous night, while describing the violence as “lower intensity”. Police said nearly 200 people were arrested across the country on Saturday.

Local authorities across the country announced bans on protests, ordered public transportation to stop in the evening and some imposed curfews during the night.

These unrest, which is a blow to France's global image just one year before the Olympic Games, will add political pressure on Macron.

He had already faced months of anger and sometimes violent demonstrations across the country after passing pension reform.

The postponement of the state visit to Germany is the second time this year he has had to cancel a high-profile event due to the domestic situation in France. In March, he canceled the planned state visit of King Charles.

FUNERAL OF A TEENAGER

Nahel, 17, of Algerian and Moroccan parents, was shot dead by a police officer during a road check on Tuesday in Nanterre, a Paris suburb.

For the funeral, several hundred people queued to enter the great mosque of Nanterre. Volunteers in yellow vests stood guard, while a few dozen passers-by watched from across the street.

Some mourners, arms crossed, said “God is greatest” in Arabic as they walked the boulevard in prayer.

Marie, 60, says she has lived in Nanterre for 50 years and there have always been problems with the police.

“This absolutely must stop. The government is completely disconnected from our reality,” she declared.

The teen's shooting, caught on video, reignited long-standing complaints from poor and racially mixed urban communities about police brutality and racism.

Nahel was known to the police for not having respected road checks and for illegally driving a rental car, the Nanterre prosecutor said on Thursday.

Macron has denied the existence of systemic racism within French law enforcement.

There is also broader anger in the country's poorest suburbs, where inequality and crime are rife and French leaders have failed for decades to combat what some politicians have called a “geographic, social and economic apartheid.” ethnic “.

BUSINESSES STORED

Rioters have burned 2,000 vehicles since the unrest began. More than 200 police officers were injured, Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin said on Saturday, specifying that the average age of those arrested was 17 years old.

Justice Minister Eric Dupont-Moretti said 30% of detainees were under 18.

More than 700 stores, supermarkets, restaurants and bank branches have been “ransacked, looted and sometimes even burned since Tuesday,” said Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire.

In Marseille, where 80 people were arrested on Friday, the police said they had arrested 60 people.

“It's very scary. We hear a helicopter and we don't go out because it's very worrying,” said Tatiana, 79, a retiree who lives in the city center.

In Lyon, France's third largest city, police deployed armored personnel carriers and a helicopter.

These unrest revived memories of the national riots of 2005 which lasted three weeks and forced President Jacques Chirac to declare a state of emergency, after the death of two young men electrocuted in an electrical substation while they were hiding from the police.

National football team players released a rare statement calling for calm. “The violence must stop to make room for mourning, dialogue and reconstruction,” they declared on the Instagram account of star Kylian Mbappé.

The South Winners supporters group, an influential Olympique de Marseille supporters group, has called on the city's youth to “be wise and show restraint”.

“By doing this, you are sullying the memory of Nahel and also dividing our city.”

Events including two concerts at the Stade de France in the Paris suburbs were canceled, while LVMH-owned fashion house Céline canceled its 2024 men's show on Sunday, creative director Hedi Slimane said on Instagram.

As the government urges social media companies to remove inflammatory content, Darmanin met with executives from Meta, Twitter, Snapchat and TikTok. Snapchat has said it has zero tolerance for content that incites violence.

The police officer, who, according to the prosecution, admitted to having fired a fatal shot at Nahel, is in preventive detention and is the subject of a formal investigation for intentional homicide, which is equivalent to an indictment according to the Anglo-Saxon courts. Saxons.

His lawyer, Laurent-Franck Lienard, said his client had aimed for the driver's leg but was hit as the car took off, prompting him to fire at his chest. “Obviously (the police officer) did not want to kill the driver,” Lienard said on BFM TV.

(Reporting by Marc Leras, Jean-Stéphane Brosse, Pascal Rossignol, Elizabeth Pineau, Noemie Olive, John Irish, Tassilo Hummels and Charlotte Van Campenhout in Amsterdam; Writing by Sandra Maler, Alexander Smith, Giles Elgood, Louise Heavens and John Irish; Editing by Cynthia Osterman, Alex Richardson, Daniel Wallis and David Gregorio)