BERLIN (AP): Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Sunday that Germany was watching the unrest in France “with concern.”
French President Emmanuel Macron postponed a state visit to Germany that was set to begin on Sunday because of turmoil on French streets in the wake of the police shooting of a teenager of North African descent.
Scholz, in an interview with Germany’s ARD television, said that, while watching with concern, he was confident that Macron would successfully calm the situation.
“I don’t expect that France will become unstable, even if the images of course are very distressing,” he said.
The crisis posed a new challenge to Macron’s leadership and exposed deep-seated discontent in low-income neighborhoods over discrimination and lack of opportunity.
France saw a fifth night of unrest. But overall violence appeared to lessen from previous nights.
Young rioters clashed with police and targeted a mayor’s home with a burning car, injuring members of his family,
Police made 719 arrests nationwide following a mass security deployment.
The 17-year-old whose death spawned the anger was laid to rest in Nanterre, a Paris suburb where emotions over his loss remain raw.
He has been identified publicly only by his first name, Nahel.
As night fell on Saturday, a small crowd gathered on the Champs-Elysees to protest his death and police violence but met hundreds of officers with batons and shields guarding the avenue and its boutiques.
In a less chic Paris neighborhood, protesters set off firecrackers and lit barricades on fire as police shot back with tear gas and stun grenades.
A burning car hit the home of the mayor of the Paris suburb of l’Hay-les-Roses.
Several schools, police stations, town halls and stores have been targeted by fires or vandalism in recent days but such a personal attack on a mayor’s home is unusual.
Mayor Vincent Jeanbrun said his wife and one of his children were injured in the 1:30 a.m. attack while they were sleeping and he was in the town hall monitoring the violence.
Jeanbrun, of the conservative opposition Republicans party, said the attack represented a new stage of “horror and ignominy” in the unrest, and urged the government to impose a state of emergency.
Regional prosecutor Stephane Hardouin opened an investigation into attempted murder, telling French television that a preliminary investigation suggests the car was meant to ram the house and set it ablaze.
He said a flame accelerant was found in a bottle in the car.
Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne went to l’Hay-les-Roses to meet Jeanbrun along with Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin and other officials, and promised that “we’re going to do everything to bring order back as soon as possible.”
Macron planned to hold a special security meeting with Borne, Darmanin and the justice minister.
Skirmishes erupted in the Mediterranean city of Marseille but appeared less intense than the night before, according to the Interior Ministry. A bolstered police contingent arrested 55 people there.
Nationwide arrests were lower than the night before. Darmanin attributed that to “the resolute action of security forces.”
The mass police deployment has been welcomed by some frightened residents of targeted neighborhoods and shop owners whose stores have been ransacked, but further frustrated those who see police behavior as the core of the crisis.
