In the night from Thursday to Friday, riots broke out again in France. Several report that French media. The protests broke out after the death of 17-year-old Nahel, who was killed by a police bullet. Just like previous nights, government buildings and cars, among other things, were set on fire. Shops were also looted.
In several French cities, the protests led to confrontations with the police. In Reims, Roubaix, Nantes and Orléans, among others, demonstrators clashed with the police. A gathering ban applies in several cities. Forty thousand police officers have been deployed in the country, 5,000 of them in Paris.
Nineteen people were arrested in the Paris region, fifteen people were arrested in Nanterre, where Nahel was killed. According to news channel BFMTV At least 421 people have already been arrested across France.
Read also: Death of French teenager by police bullet leads to furious reactions
‘Justice doing its job’
A police officer shot 17-year-old Nahel from close range on Tuesday in the Parisian suburb of Nanterre, who was forced to stop his car by the police for allegedly breaking traffic rules. The teenager of Algerian origin did so, but then suddenly drove on, after which the police allegedly fired. According to the officer, Nahel had threatened to run over the officers.
The 17-year-old victim died almost immediately on the spot. The 38-year-old officer who shot the teenager has been arrested on suspicion of manslaughter. He will be arraigned on Thursday. He has apologized through his lawyer. “He is devastated, he really does not get up in the morning to kill people,” said his lawyer.
For decades, residents of the banlieues, the outer cities in France, have complained about violence and racism by the police. “We demand that justice does its job, otherwise we will do it our own way,” a young demonstrator from Nanterre told Reuters news agency.
It is not the first time that a police action has led to demonstrations. In 2005, France was unsettled for three weeks after two young people died in the Parisian suburb of Clichy-sous-Bois. They were electrocuted when they hid from the police in a power station. Then President Jacques Chirac declared a state of emergency.