Paris Revolt No Surprise: Officials

"This has been a bomb waiting for the match to strike," Serge Lotterie, a council member of Villiers-le-Bel, told the Washington Post on Wednesday, November 28.

Villiers-le-Bel, a commune in the northern suburbs of Paris, was one of the areas which saw the outbreak of riots by rage-filled suburbanites following the death of two teens in a police car crash on Sunday.

Angry youths hurled petrol bombs and bricks at police, torching cars and buildings in the three-day of chaos.

Some, armed with hunting gunshots and rifles, injured at least 120 police officers dramatically upping the stakes in the face-off.

The scenes replayed the deadly violence that gripped France in 2005 after two youths of immigrant origin were electrocuted to death while escaping police.

Politicians insist the "warfare" should raise no eyebrows because the suburbs remained a powder keg after the 2005 riots.

"Two years ago, I said that it would just take a spark for France to blow up," Claude Dilain, the mayor of Clichy-sous-Bois, where the 2005 riots first erupted, told the Guardian.

President Nicola Sarkozy invited Wednesday the parents of the dead boys to the Elysée and promised a manslaughter probe by an independent investigating judge.

Nonetheless, he vowed that rioters who shot at police would be severely punished.

"Those who take it into their hands to shoot at officials will find themselves in court."

In 2005, then interior minister Sarkozy added insult to injury by describing immigrant youths as "scum" and "rabble."

Forgotten

Officials believe that torching cars and official buildings reflected anger and frustration.

"The suburbs are like tinderboxes," François Pupponi, mayor of the riot—hit suburb of Sarcelles, told the New York Times.

"We have heard promise after promise, but nothing has been done in the suburbs since the last riots, nothing.

"You have people in terrible social circumstances, plus all the rage, plus all the hate, plus all the rumors, and all you need is one spark to set them on fire."

Raymonde Le Texier, a Socialist senator who was mayor of Villiers-le-Bel for a decade, agreed.

"People feel forgotten by the government powers, and it's the truth."

Politicians admit that youths in the poor suburban areas, many of North African origin, have to put up with racism, unemployment, poor schools and housing, tougher immigration laws and above all government's disregard.

Lotterie, of Villiers-le-Bel council, noted that widespread racism is adding to the woes of people from immigrant-origin.

"If you want to work in Charles de Gaulle -- the nearby international airport -- and if you're from Villiers-le-Bel, you're black and your name is Mohammed, there's no chance."

A September UN report warned that France's ethnic minorities are trapped in social and economic "ghettos" because of an "insidious racism" tolerated by politicians.

There are some 4.5 million immigrants in France, according to estimates in mid-2006.

But there is no official number of people of Arab or African origin because French laws ban census based on ethnic or religious grounds.

Lotterie said that in his commune, inhabited by 27,000 people from 50 ethnic and religious groups, the unemployment rate is up to 40 percent.

Some apartment units may shelter as many as four poverty-stricken families.

"Some rent out their kitchens, so you can imagine how people live there.

"These guys have nothing," said the council member.

"They stand in the streets at night with their hoods up and wait for things to happen, and so they close in on themselves and forget about integration."