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France extending emergency order to Feb.
(AP)
Updated: 2005-11-14 21:05
The French Cabinet approved a bill Monday to extend the country's state of
emergency for three months, while youths set schools ablaze and waged other
scattered arson attacks across France.
A firefighter stands near a car set ablaze in
the La Reynerie housing project of Toulouse, southern France, Sunday, Nov.
13, 2005. France's worst rioting since the 1960s seems to be nearing an
end, the national police chief said Sunday, with fewer cars torched
nationwide. [AP] |
Though the unrest is abating, the bill, if approved by parliament as
expected, would allow a 12-day state of emergency to be prolonged until
mid-February if needed. The emergency measures empower regions to impose curfews
on minors, conduct house searches and take other steps to prevent unrest.
"It is a measure of protection and precaution," President Jacques Chirac
said.
Chirac stressed that the measure was "temporary" and that regional officials
would use it "only where it is strictly necessary." About 40 French towns,
including France's third-largest city, Lyon, have used the measure to put
curfews for minors into effect.
Overnight, the number of car-torchings — a barometer of the unrest — dropped
sharply, with youths setting fire to 284 vehicles, compared to 374 the previous
night, police said Monday. There were no clashes between police and rioters.
"The lull is confirmed," national police spokesman Patrick Hamon said. A week
ago, 1,400 cars were incinerated in a single night.
The 18 nights of arson attacks and riots — set off by the accidental
electrocution deaths of two teens who thought police were chasing them — began
in Paris' poor suburbs, where many immigrants from North and West Africa live
with their French-born children in high-rise housing projects.
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