As Violence Ebbs, Sarkozy Calls Riots Unacceptable
By ELAINE SCIOLINO
The New York Times
November 29, 2007
PARIS, Nov. 28 — President Nicolas Sarkozy made a lightning strike into France’s troubled suburbs today, visiting a wounded police captain and pledging afterward in front of the trailing television cameras to bring attacking rioters to justice.
At 7:30 a.m., just hours after returning home from China, Mr. Sarkozy was at a hospital in the suburb of Eaubonne, north of Paris, lending his support to the police officer, who had been injured during clashes with rioters that started late Sunday.
“So that things are very clear: what has happened is absolutely unacceptable,” Mr. Sarkozy said outside the hospital. He added that those who fired the shots would find themselves in court.
After two nights of rioting Sunday and Monday night, largely in the north Paris suburb of Villiers-le-Bel, the situation eased Tuesday night following the massive deployment of 1,000 anti-riot police there.
Mr. Sarkozy described the event that sparked the violence — the death of two teenage boys whose motorbike collided with a police car in Villiers-le-Bel — as “not something that we can tolerate.” But he criticized those who seized on the incident to seek vengeance through violence.
“There’s no link between what happened with these perfectly innocent two young boys and shooting at public officials,” Mr. Sarkozy said.
Mr. Sarkozy made no other stop in the suburbs and did not linger in Eaubonne, but his brief visit was symbolically important.
His performance as a zero-tolerance, law-and-order interior minister for former President Jacques Chirac was much criticized by residents of France’s working- and lower-class suburbs, and during his presidential campaign he stayed away from the tough neighborhoods in the suburbs that were consumed by three weeks of violence in late 2005.
During the campaign last April, for example, he abruptly canceled a visit to a neighborhood of the eastern city of Lyon as 100 protesters gathered there. Some brandished signs that read, “Sarkozy, you are not welcome here,” others shouting, “Scum,” and “Karcher.”
The words “scum” and “Karcher” have come to be both identified with Mr. Sarkozy and emblematic of his difficult relationship with France’s ethnic Arab and African populations. In 2005, he vowed to clean out young troublemakers from one Paris suburb with a Karcher, the brand name of a high-powered hose used to wash off graffiti, and also pledged to rid poor neighborhoods of their “scum.”
He has never fulfilled his promise to return to Argenteuil, where he used the term “scum” and was pelted with bottles and rocks in 2005.
Later in the morning today, Mr. Sarkozy met at the Élysée Palace with the families of the two teenagers who died in Villiers-le-Bel. Mr. Sarkozy said he was opening a judicial inquiry into the deaths, Jean-Pierre Mignard, a lawyer for the relatives, told reporters, according to the news agency Agence France-Presse.
Mr. Mignard was quoted as welcoming the move, adding that it would allow the families and their representatives “to participate actively in the search for the truth.”
At least in one neighborhood of Eaubonne today, Mr. Sarkozy was warmly welcomed.
“He’s doing a great job,” said Jean-Claude Morard, 63, a retired window cleaner, over coffee at a local café.
“He’s right to show others that he’s the boss. For once we have a good guy in power!”
He added, "I prefer a guy who’s involved in every matter of his country than someone who stays in his ivory tower."
Antonio Da Silva, 36, the owner of a kitchen contracting company, agreed. “He comes as a showman, that’s for sure, but this is a brave man,” he said.
But just down the street, in front of the local McDonald’s, there was the residual distrust of Mr. Sarkozy that has long characterized his relationship with many residents of the suburbs.
"It’s a show in the American style!" said Marcel Lutz, 68, a retired printer, of Mr. Sarkozy’s visit. He added: "He doesn’t need to be everywhere. We are not in a state of siege here!"
Outside a shopping center in Soisy-sous-Montmorency a few miles away, Carole Baron, 27, a worker in a beauty salon, characterized the visit as a temporary gesture at best.
"Sarko’s visit might put people at rest after what happened two days ago, but to me, it won’t change anything," she said, adding, "Coming here is certainly an act of kindness but I doubt it’ll make things move or have any kind of influence." |
