Let the Torchings Resume

Two more buses torched by thugs in masks and waving guns. Riot police are on patrol, but their routes and areas of assignment are limited to prevent further rioting. That makes six buses damaged/destroyed in just the past week.

The police are bearing the brunt of this - more than 2,500 injured in the fighting.

No one is willing to identify those behind the rioting other than calling them youths, even though everyone knows that these riots are nearly all caused by Muslim immigrants who either refuse to assimilate into French culture or are rebuffed from doing so.

Welcome to France 2006.

UPDATE:
Was a police raid the reason behind the latest rioting resulting in torched buses? That's the implication being made here:

But a heavy-handed police raid with racial overtones, in Evry south of Paris, appears to have been at least partially responsible for the bus burnings. Police entered a cafe on Monday and demanded to see the papers of the customers of African and North African descent.

Arguments broke out and police used tear gas and made several arrests. A bus was burned by youths in the nearby estate that night in retaliation for what they called an "attack on our fathers".

Last year's riots broke out after two youths, aged 17 and 15, were electrocuted in a power sub-station at Clichy-sous-Bois northeast of Paris while fleeing police. Over the next three weeks, car-burning and attacks on public buildings - by brown, black and white youths - spread.

So, asking to see papers turns into riots? Next thing we're going to hear, the rioters will start rioting if you even think of looking at them crossways.

Since this is the anniversary of the riots, there were speeches and demonstrations that were mostly peaceful. They memorialized the two teens who died after being electrocuted at a power substation where they hid after being chased by police. The French authorities aren't taking chances as they've deployed thousands of reinforcements.

Forbes has more:

Clichy-sous-Bois has no police station, so officers patrolling here come from outside and have no connection to residents. There is no public transportation and few families own cars, leaving most people virtually trapped.

Unemployment among its 28,000 residents is 23.5 percent - well above the 9 percent national average - and is 32 percent for those between the ages of 15 and 24, according to the newspaper La Croix.

The police presence was extremely discreet at Friday's march. But police fanned out elsewhere to brace for possible nighttime violence, with 500 extra riot police assigned to Paris' poor neighborhoods for the anniversary.

What is left unspoken is why this area doesn't have a regular police presence. That would be the making of a good news report. It would also explain why police have to come into the area and are unfamiliar to the local residents.

Some 100 cars were torched nationwide overnight, half of them in the Paris region, police officials said. The figure was higher than usual - police say between 30 and 50 cars are set on fire during an average week, though some weekends the figure jumps to 100. On the most fiery night of last year's riots, more than 1,400 cars went up in flames.

This part doesn't jibe with the reports I've seen elsewhere. Indeed, the rate of cars torched in the past year average of 112 per night for the first six months of this year alone. That's 21,000 cars for January to June 2006.

An average of 112 cars a day have been torched across France so far this year and there have been 15 attacks a day on police and emergency services. Nearly 3,000 police officers have been injured in clashes this year.

Someone must be feeding Forbes bum information to downplay the seriousness of the rioting.

And if you're planning on going to Paris, here's a handy dandy guide to avoiding a riot ruining your day (or finding your car turned into a barbeque.

Technorati: riot, paris riots, paris, france, banlieu, muslim immigrant.