100 cars set alight in France

Scotsman:

French police said about 100 vehicles were burned overnight, which marked an average weekend tally for urban violence and did not signify a flare-up of violence after riots last month.

Some French regions have banned retail sales of petrol during the Christmas holidays to prevent a recurrence of violence after three weeks of riots in which youths used home-made bombs and set fire to cars and buildings.

Long before the unrest, teenagers in poorer neighbourhoods of large French cities began the custom of celebrating New Year's Eve by torching hundreds of cars.

National Police spokeswoman Catherine Casteran said on Sunday that about 100 cars were reported burned overnight on Christmas Eve, which was equivalent to "an ordinary weekend" and the number of vehicles burned last Christmas.

Police did not encounter any notable tension overnight on Saturday to Sunday, Casteran said.

Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy said this week the government would maintain the state of emergency declared during the riots and remained "very vigilant" with the approach of year-end celebrations.

Youths, mostly from housing projects in France's poor suburbs, set fire to some 9,000 vehicles over three weeks of arson attacks, rioting and other unrest that prompted the government to declare a state of emergency, allowing the use of curfews and other measures to stop the mayhem.

It was France's worst civil unrest since student and worker protests in 1968.

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