France imposed emergency measures on Wednesday in 38 suburbs, towns and cities including Paris, even as police said a wave of riots was waning despite a 13th straight night of firebombs and torched cars. Overnight, 617 vehicles had been destroyed, police said, about half the number from the night before. “We are seeing a sharp drop in hostile acts,” the national police director, Michel Gaudin, told a news briefing.Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin’s decree invokes a 50-year-old law that gives regional government officials the power to impose nightly curfews against the rioters, mainly protesting against unemployment and racism.Claude Gueant, an aide to Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, said the unrest appeared to have peaked. “We have reasons to believe that wisdom will prevail in the districts affected by the violence,” he told Europe 1 radio. Major cities covered by emergency powers include Marseille, Strasbourg, Lyon and Toulouse, as well as Paris suburbs where the unrest erupted on October 27 with the deaths of two youngsters apparently fleeing police. Fears of riots erupting in other European countries have helped push down the value of the euro, and neighbouring Belgium and Germany have been hit by copycat incidents of arson although they have not faced any riots. Villepin declined to take any questions during parliamentary question time on Wednesday. But Sarkozy told deputies some 120 foreigners convicted of participating in the disturbances would be expelled, including those with residence permits. —Reuters
