PARIS, June 30 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Unrest erupted in France for a second night in a row as security forces deployed in the thousands to prevent more violent protests over the fatal shooting of a teenager by police.
Around 2,000 riot police have been called up in suburbs around Paris, after a 17-year-old was shot in the chest at point-blank range on Tuesday morning.
The death sparked clashes and arson attacks in several Paris suburbs overnight on Tuesday, with 31 people arrested and 24 police officers injured.
Overnight on Wedensday, trash bins were set on fire and fireworks set off in the western suburb of Nanterre, where the shooting took place, as well as other communes of the Hauts-de-Seine region to the west of Paris, and in the eastern city of Dijon.
In the Essonne region to the south of the capital, a group of people set a bus on fire after having all the passengers get off, police said.
In the southern city of Toulouse, several cars were torched and responding police and firefighters pelted with projectiles as thick black smoke billowed high into the sky, a police source said.
About 16 people have been arrested across the country, police said shortly after midnight.
“A teenager was killed. That is inexplicable and unforgivable,” President Emmanuel Macron said during an official visit to Marseille, southern France.
“Nothing can justify the death of a young person.”
The victim, named as Nahel M. from the western Paris suburb of Nanterre, was pulled over by two policemen for breaking traffic rules while driving a yellow Mercedes on Tuesday morning.
Police initially reported that an officer had shot at the teenager because he was driving his car at him, but this version of events was contradicted by a video circulating on social media.
The footage shows the two policemen standing by the side of the stationary car, with one pointing a weapon at the driver.
A voice is heard saying “You are going to get a bullet in the head.”
The police officer then appears to fire as the car abruptly drives off.
Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne told parliament that the operation “was obviously not in line with the rules of engagement for police”.
Last year, 13 people were killed in France after refusing to stop for police traffic checks, with a law change in 2017 that gave greater powers to officers to use their weapons now under scrutiny.
But the shooting also follows a series of deaths among the ranks of serving police officers that have provoked widespread public sympathy.
The victim, Nahel, was a delivery driver who had dropped out of high school.
The 38-year old policeman filmed firing the lethal shot was taken into custody afterwards and is under investigation for voluntary manslaughter.
Nahel M.’s lawyer, Yassine Bouzrou, said he would also file an additional complaint for false testimony over the allegation that Nahel had tried to run them over.
There were two passengers in the car. One ran off and the other, also a teenager, was briefly detained. — NNN-AGENCIES
