There were further clashes between police and protesters in Paris. According to one reporter, police used tear gas on Thursday after riots broke out on the sidelines of a memorial march for a young man who was shot dead by police. It was also announced that buses and trams would no longer run in the Paris region on Thursday from 7pm.
Authorities were preparing for a third consecutive night of riots. By Friday night, 40,000 police officers would be on duty across the country, about four times as many as on Wednesday. The riots were sparked by a police officer’s fatal shooting of a young man of North African descent during a traffic stop in the working-class Parisian suburb of Nanterre on Tuesday. The Public Prosecutor’s Office opened proceedings against the police officer on suspicion of manslaughter.
Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin announced that 150 people were arrested across the country during serious disturbances on Thursday night. Dozens of police officers were injured in clashes with demonstrators, the minister said.
Only 5,000 officers are expected to be deployed in the greater Paris area on Friday night. On the second night of the protest, several buildings in several cities were attacked or set on fire by authorities. The most violent clashes took place in Nanterre, where the murdered young man named Nahel lived. On Thursday night, an angry mob set cars on fire and fired fireworks at police.
There were also clashes between police and protesters in Lille in the north and Toulouse in the southwest. Police said there were also riots in Amiens, Dijon and the Essonne department south of Paris.
President Emmanuel Macron described the violence as “unjustifiable”. According to the Public Ministry, Nahel did not stop the car despite the police request. Already on Wednesday night, after he was killed by a policeman, there was violence in the streets, which Macron called “unforgivable”. On Wednesday, Macron described the 17-year-old’s violent death as inexcusable. “We have a young man who has been killed, it is inexplicable and inexcusable,” he said in Marseille. “Nothing justifies the death of a young man.”
Police violence and riots have been a regular occurrence in France for a long time – especially in the poorer suburbs of big cities, where people of different ethnic backgrounds live. Human rights groups say there is systematic racism in law enforcement agencies in France.