Rioting spreads beyond Paris suburbs
(AP)
Updated: 2005-11-05 13:45

Still, the violence has alarmed the government of President Jacques Chirac, whose calls for calm have gone unheeded.

"This is the first time (suburban violence) has lasted so long and the government appears taken aback at the magnitude," said Pascal Perrineau, director of the Center for Study of French Political Life.

There were "few direct clashes" with security forces late Thursday and early Friday, however, no bullets fired at police, and far fewer large groups of rioters, said Jean-Francois Cordet, the top government official in Seine-Saint-Denis.

Instead, Cordet said, the unrest in Seine-Saint-Denis was led by "numerous small and highly mobile groups."

The unrest erupted with youths angered over the deaths of Bouna Traore, 15, and Zyed Benna, 17, who were electrocuted when they hid in a power substation in the suburb of Clichy-sous-Bois.

Traore's brother, Siyakah Traore, called for protesters to "calm down and stop ransacking everything."

"This is not how we are going to have our voices heard," he told RTL radio, adding his voice to neighborhood groups working to stop the violence.

Late Friday in Meaux, east of Paris, youths prevented firefighters from evacuating a sick person from an apartment in a housing project, pelting them with stones and torching the awaiting ambulance, the Interior Ministry officer said.

"I'm not able to sleep at night because you never know when a fire might break out," said Mammed Chukri, 36, a Kurdish immigrant from northern Iraq living near the warehouse that burned in Aubervilliers. "I have three children and I live in a five-story building. If a fire hit, what would I do?"

Dozens of residents and community leaders were stepping in to defuse tensions, with some walking between rioters and police to urge youths to back down.

Abderrhamane Bouhout, head of the Bilal mosque in Clichy-sous-Bois, said he had enlisted 50 youths to try stop the violence. "We've had positive results," he said.