| | Here you go Phil: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_Paris_suburb_riots
From the section subtitled "Background":
Immigration of Arabs and Berbers from North Africa has noticeably changed the Demographics of France since the 1960s, especially in Marseilles and Paris, with an estimated 1 million immigrating in the 1960s following the French rule in Algeria, and by 1994 about 5 million people of Muslim extraction were estimated to live in France (French law prohibits the collection of religion-related demographic data in census; according to a 2000 study, there were an estimated 4.1 million people of "Muslim extraction" in France). The Seine-Saint-Denis département has the largest Arab concentration in France (around 30%), with high unemployment rates (30% in La Courneuve), and is one of the départements with the highest incidence of violent crime. Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy in an October 2005 interview with Le Monde said that violent crime is a matter of daily life in suburbs all over France, quoting that, from January to October 2005, 9000 police cars had been stoned, and each night, 20 to 40 cars were torched. [26]. For 2004, officials from the Gendarmerie Nationale report 2,432 vehicles torched and 12,362 incidents of urban violence [27]. In October 2001, a synagogue in Clichy-sous-Bois was attacked with a Molotov cocktail and the same synagogue was attacked again in August 2002 [28]
Many residents of Clichy-sous-Bois and nearby areas are first or second generation Muslims from former French colonies; half of the suburb's population of 28,000 are aged under twenty-five. [29]. According to The Guardian, "the unrest has highlighted tensions between wealthy big cities and their grim ghettoised banlieues, home to immigrants from the Maghreb and West Africa who have never been fully integrated into French society and have become an underclass for whom hopelessness and discrimination are normal."
The BBC wrote that the riots illustrate "discontent among many French youths of North African origin". It contends that North African Muslims face discrimination in many areas of life in Paris highlighting that "the pressure group SOS Racisme regularly highlights cases of employers discarding applicants with foreign names." [30] The Australian reports that assimilation has failed, evidenced by the large numbers of immigrants living in poor, run-down suburbs of Paris.
Laws providing for restrictions on display of religious symbols in schools, including the Muslim hijab, have also been the source of debate and political tension in France. These laws, intended to enforce secularity in schools, are especially resented by some Muslims.
French colonial history, mostly in Algeria, is seen by a growing number of minority activists ("Manifeste des indigènes de la République") as the main source of discrimination against ethnic minorities whose family background lies in North of Subsaharan Africa and in the Caribbean and Indian Ocean former colonies.
There are several million French citizens with a Muslim or Caribbean background but not a single metropolitan MP with the same background in the Assemblée nationale (there are however MPs representing Martinique, French Polynesia, Réunion etc.). The two first metropolitan senators with a Muslim Algerian or Moroccan background, Alima Boumedienne-Thiery (Greens) and Bariza Khiari (Parti Socialiste), entered the Senate only in september 2004. There are currently ministers of North African origin in the government.
Azouz Begag, "ministre délégué à la promotion de l'égalité des chances" ("delegate minister for the promotion of equality of opportunities", the ministry devoted to rooting out discrimination, is of Algerian origins. He made several declarations about the recent unrest, opposing himself to Interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy.
The Union nationale des syndicats autonomes (UNSA) des policiers, a police work union, has suggested that recent budget cuts in the "proximity police" ("police de proximité", police units in charge for preventing crime and tensions in the "cités") should be reversed.
Warnings have come from a variety of publications that this long-simmering situation would boil over into the riots being witnessed today.[31]
Some aspects of French society are questioning whether France can integrate its Muslim community, which remains hopelessly segregated.[32]
"The republican model of integration of ethnic minorities is in trouble," said Maurice Szafran, the publisher of Marianne magazine. "The young people of the suburbs are not in agreement with any aspect of this model."[33]
Edit: BTW, when this is as easy as typing "Paris riots" into Wiki's search box, I don't really feel obligated to belabor it in the news post with half a dozen links. That's pretty much a basic internet skill these days.
(Edited by Andrew Bissell on 11/04, 12:35am)
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