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Strategies & Market Trends : 2026 TeoTwawKi ... 2032 Darkest Interregnum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: daddunes who wrote (1916)	11/7/2005 10:32:10 PM
From: elmatador	Respond to of 217830

Copycat arsonists strike in Belgium and Germany Brussels police ordered extra patrols on to the streets last night after cars were set alight in the Belgian capital in copycat attacks following the riots in France. Five cars were set alight late on Sunday night around the Gare du Midi, well known to British travellers as the Eurostar's Belgian terminus. At first the police denied any link to the French unrest, noting that by the time their officers reached the burning cars they found each scene deserted. This was in sharp contrast with the confrontations between French police and large gatherings of young, disaffected locals. But by yesterday afternoon police acknowledged that there was almost certainly a link with the French events. Supt Albert Roosens, a spokesman for the Midi police district, said: "When our people went to the scene, there was no gathering of people, there was no riot. And we have had no claims of responsibility." However, he admitted the scale of the arson attacks was unusual. Officers normally encounter no more than two or three burning vehicles a month in the Midi district that takes in both poor immigrant districts and gentrified streets of art nouveau houses. "Normally we get a few, but randomly, either for revenge or for the insurance," Supt Roosens said. "It is unusual to get so many at one time." German police were also on high alert last night after cars were set alight in two cities in attacks seen as copying the unrest in France. Five cars were destroyed in Berlin and a further six in Bremen in the early hours of yesterday morning, police said. It was unclear whether the violence was inspired by events across the border, which police said "could not be ruled out", or whether the attacks were random. Politicians tried to play down fears that the trouble that has spread across France would reach Germany, describing France's problems as different. "The conditions in France are different to what we have here," said Wolfgang Schäuble, who is expected to be interior minister in Germany's new government. "We don't have the large blocks of flats you see outside French cities," he said. "But we do have areas where foreigners are increasingly disconnected from the mainstream. "We must improve integration, particularly of young people." Germany's largest ethnic minority is Turkish - 3.2 million Turks live across the country, with the largest community living in Berlin. The government's spokesman, Thomas Steg, yesterday warned "armchair sociologists" not to assume that the French riots would spread to Germany.