Riots Riots Everywhere

The situation in France is not getting any better. The streets are still aflame with torched cars and buses, police are continuing to be assaulted by the nameless and faceless thugs that everyone knows are Muslim immigrants but everyone in the media appears incapable of identifying, and the thugs are getting more brazen and violent in their attacks.

De Villepin says that he's going to strengthen the penalties on the vandals who are involved in these attacks. How about doing more to prevent them in the first place - by vigorously policing the banlieus where the attacks are occurring. How about arresting all those involved, and not just giving them slaps on the wrist. Last year's riots left nearly 10,000 cars torched, but very few arrests were made out of fear that the arrests might breed more violence. That only showed the French authority's reluctance to crack down and the torchings became more widespread.

And some in the French media are owning up to the fact that they've been covering up the true extent of the rioting (english translation via Babelfish). That's a start. But the French government better take action swiftly or else completely lose whatever control they have left over the situation. No pasaran has more.

Some are trying to distance the French rioting from its participants' religious heritage. The message is that this isn't jihad. It may not have started out that way, but the Islamists have coopted the situation for their own goals and aims, and avoiding that situation means that one of the reasons for the ongoing violence is not addressed. Mentioning that the French authorities are hauled in front of the EU's human rights organzation only serves to excuse the behavior of the thugs running the streets.


Rioting is not confined to the streets of the French banlieus.

They're also ongoing in Mexico. They're just as violent, and just as deadly.

Federal police armed with assault rifles and riot shields stormed this normally picturesque tourist destination Sunday, bypassing barricades and touching off fierce street battles as they tried to end five months of protests and violence.

Officers in black helmets entered the city from several sides, reinforced by armored vehicles, trucks mounted with high-pressure water cannons and bulldozers. Helicopters roared overhead.

Police marched up to a metal barrier blocking the historic city center — which has served as home base for the protests since late May — but pulled back as protesters armed with poles and sticks attacked them from behind, hurling burning tires.

Protesters could be seen readying Molotov cocktails and other homemade bombs, but had yet to use them against police, who fired tear gas canisters. The area filled with black smoke from burning cars. Some protesters used syringes to pierce their arms and legs, then paint signs decrying the police in blood.

"I think their strategy isn't working," said protest organizer Hugo Pacheco, leading a group against a column of police holding a position three blocks from the city center. "I don't think this has worked for them because the people, we, the people, are right."

What began in late May as a teacher's strike in this colonial southern Mexican city of some 275,000 people spiraled into chaos after local police tried to retake the central plaza the following month. Since then, anarchists, students and Indian groups demanded the ouster of Oaxaca state Gov. Ulises Ruiz.

UPDATE:
Fixed posting time - which was originally 10:40AM EST, not the PM.

UPDATE:
This story adds new details to the violence.

A group of teenagers reportedly forced open the doors of the bus vehicle and threw a flammable liquid inside before fleeing.

A 26-year-old French woman of Senegalese origin was unable to escape and suffered burns to 70% of her body.

About 200 vehicles were set alight in incidents around the country on Saturday, and nearly 50 people were arrested.

French news agency AFP said youths in Grenoble threw a stone from a bridge onto a tram, smashing the window and injuring the driver.

So, we learn that the violence isn't confined to the banlieus around Paris, but are also occurring in other parts of the country.

Meanwhile, the situation in Oaxaca, Mexico hasn't settled down completely either. The Mexican troops have retaken the main square but the threat of more violence still looms.

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