After the funeral of a North African teenager who was shot by police, tens of thousands of police were deployed across France on Saturday to prevent a sixth night of rioting.
President Emmanuel Macron postponed a state visit to Germany scheduled for Sunday to deal with his largest crisis since the “Yellow Vest” protests paralyzed most of France in late 2018.
Interior minister Gerald Darmanin said 45,000 police would be out Saturday night, with reinforcements going to Lyon and Marseille.
A witness said police used tear gas on protestors in Marseille’s main high street at about twilight on Saturday.
After a social media summons to assemble at the Place de la Concorde, Paris police evicted demonstrators and reinforced security along the Champs Elysees. TV footage showed boarded-up store facades.
The interior ministry reported 1,311 arrests on Friday night, up from 875 the night before, despite “lower intensity” violence.
Finance minister Bruno Le Maire claimed more than 700 shops, supermarkets, restaurants, and bank branches had been “ransacked, looted and sometimes even burnt to the ground since Tuesday”.
Demonstrations and evening public transport were banned nationwide by local authorities.
On Tuesday, a Nanterre police officer shot 17-year-old Algerian-Moroccan Nahel during a traffic stop.
For the burial, several hundred people waited to enter Nanterre’s magnificent mosque, guarded by volunteers in yellow vests, while a few dozen passersby watched from across the street.
Some mourners, arms crossed, chanted “God is Greatest” in Arabic as they prayed across the boulevard.
Marie, 60, lived in Nanterre for 50 years and always had police issues.
“This must stop. “The government is totally out of touch,” she stated.
The teenager’s videotaped shooting has revived poor and ethnically mixed urban neighborhoods’ grievances of police violence and bigotry.
“If you have the wrong skin colour, the police are much more dangerous to you,” said a young man who declined to be named and was Nahel’s buddy.
The Nanterre prosecutor said Thursday that Nahel was known to police for failing to comply with traffic stop orders and driving a rental car illegally. Macron denies police racism.
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