French police are struggling to contain a gang war in northeastern Paris that has left one dead and several injured, as local people complain they are being fenced into high-rise ghettos to make way for the middle class.
The 19th arrondissement in northern Paris was supposed to be celebrating its renaissance this fall with the old state funeral parlor transformed into a major new arts quarter opening next month.
But north of the canal, a war between rival gangs on high-rise housing estates has escalated, with riot police moving in to control it. For 15 years, local rivalries between the Curial and Riquet housing estates have seen vicious knife-fights and score-settling, but now more youths are turning to the gun.
Last week, a 23-year-old postman was shot dead in the street. Days afterward, a man from a rival estate survived a shooting, but was left with serious leg injuries. On Wednesday, two teenagers were being treated in hospital after an attack in which one of them had his stomach slashed open with a knife only meters from the site of the fatal shooting.
“There are two 19th arrondissements, the rich and us, and we’re being shut away in high-rises and forgotten,” the mother of one teenager said.
Local youths have been reduced to the slang labels black, beur, (north African) or feuj, the back-to-front slang for juif or Jew. Last summer, a local Jewish teenager was left in a coma after an attack that caused French President Nicolas Sarkozy to make a statement warning against anti-semitism. But social workers believe the real divide is not over race or religion but geography, with streets tagged as frontiers or no-go zones and youths targeted according to the estate where they live.
A town hall official, who researched the cause of the “war” between the rival high-rises, said he was at a loss to determine the origin of the feud — whether it was a soccer match gone wrong or a robbery. He likened it to an age-old family feud in Brittany — no one could remember why they were fighting any more.
“I don’t even want to bring my three-year-old son to see my mother in case he gets shot,” said Khedidja, 27.
Her brother, Moussa, 23, was shot in the leg last week as he left his apartment block to see friends after breaking the Ramadan fast.
“People don’t want to go out anymore. It’s as if the estate you come from is stamped on your forehead and the others see you as the enemy. I refuse to be scared, that would mean they’ve won,” Khedidja said.
She said neither her brother, from Cural estate, nor the murder victim, from Riquet estate, were gang leaders — they had simply been caught in the crossfire.
“This is nowhere near over,” said one social worker, arguing for better education facilities and youth groups.
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was