France vows tough action over riots

PARIS - France's interior minister pressed home a pledge of tough action to curb urban unrest by angry youths, including the expulsion of foreigners involved in 17 successive nights of violence.

Youths set fire to a nursery school on Saturday night (local time) and police fired tear gas to disperse a group that attacked cars and stalls in France's second city Lyon earlier in the day in the first violence to hit a city centre.

But the intensity of the unrest by disaffected French citizens of Arab and African origin as well as white youths protesting against unemployment, racism and harsh police treatment continued to fall from its peak last Sunday.

Some 315 vehicles had been set ablaze by 4am (3pm NZT) on Sunday, compared to 384 at the same time the previous night, and 161 people had been detained, police said.

"What is interesting is the fall in the number of vehicles burnt," a police spokesman said.

Violence has dropped since the government adopted emergency measures last week including curfews. Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy met police in central Paris and restated a pledge to throw out foreigners caught rioting.

"If you want to live in France with a residency permit you have to abide by the laws. ... Immigration laws allow expulsions. I am the interior minister and I will apply the law," he said.

Central Paris remained calm as thousands of police deployed and authorities enforced a ban on gatherings that could provoke trouble during the Armistice holiday weekend marking the end of World War One.

"All those who wish to commit acts of violence will be brought to justice," Sarkozy said.

He has been criticised by the rioters and by politicians for tough language and he was heckled when he inspected security forces on Saturday evening on the boulevard Champs Elysees, seen as a possible flashpoint.

But in a poll published in Le Journal du Dimanche newspaper, 53 per cent of those surveyed said they were confident Sarkozy could resolve the problems in impoverished suburbs.

The worst unrest to hit France in 40 years has given a new twist to rivalries in the run-up to presidential elections in 2007, in which Sarkozy is seen as one of several possible candidates along with Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin.

Some 52 per cent of the 953 people voted yes for Villepin when asked to say whether each of a list of prominent politicians could solve problems in the suburbs.

The opposition Socialist party's leader and possible candidate for the presidency, Francois Hollande, polled 31.

President Jacques Chirac, accused of keeping too low a profile during the crisis, polled 29 per cent.

In the southern town of Carpentras, where the nursery school was set on fire, a burning car was pushed up to an old people's home, causing panic among residents, police said. The previous night two fire bombs were thrown at a mosque in Carpentras.

Elsewhere, a member of the riot police force was injured after being hit by a metal ball thrown from an apartment block in a suburb outside Paris, police said.

The violence has sparked a debate, not just on how to restore order but also on social problems in poor suburbs and the integration of immigrants.

Many of those involved say they have been frozen out of the benefits offered by French society and discriminated against because of their racial origin or because they live in grim suburbs outside big towns and cities.

"We must make France a country of diversity and one in which different people are accepted," Azouz Begag, minister delegate for parity and professional equality, told Le Parisien newspaper.

- REUTERS