The French government said yesterday it would ask parliament to grant a three-month extension to emergency powers it invoked to help curb the worst urban violence in almost 40 years. Although the violence dropped again overnight, police said youths destroyed 374 vehicles in petrol bomb attacks in the 18th straight night of unrest in poor suburbs in the Paris region and major provincial cities. Disturbances erupted on Oct. 27 after the deaths of two youths apparently fleeing police but grew into a wider protest by youths of African and North African origin at racism, poor job prospects and their sense of exclusion from French society.

Government spokesman Jean-Francois Cope told Europe 1 radio that yesterday’s special cabinet session would send to the National Assembly a bill extending the 12-day emergency powers act by three months from November 21, when the current measures expire. “The bill allows the government to end them by decree before the expiry date if that is compatible with the goal of restoring public order,” Cope said. On Nov. 8 the government of Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin revived a 50-year-old colonial-era law to grant prefects, the government’s top local officials, broad powers to impose curfews and other restrictions on designated areas.

The conservative government decree named 38 towns, cities and urban areas around France, including the capital Paris. However, few prefects have made use of the new powers. It was unclear how the substantial extension of the life of the emergency powers would be greeted by the opposition Socialists, who invoked the same 1955 law when in government in the 1980s.

<B>Integration of immigrants</B>

Some local mayors have already criticised the measure as an overreaction and potentially inflammatory. The government has a comfortable majority in parliament and the measure should pass with ease.

Rioters, who also include white youths, torched 1,400 cars across France last Sunday but violence has dropped sharply since that peak. Police said 10 youths were arrested in the southwestern city of Toulouse after youths burned 10 vehicles on Sunday and damaged a school, driving a burning car against its gates.

The disturbances are the worst in France since student riots in 1968 and have shaken the government of President Jacques Chirac, sparked a debate on the integration of immigrants and caused ripples throughout Europe. The main problem behind the unrest was youth unemployment but the challenge of integrating immigrants was shared by many European cities, he said.

An editorial in yesterday’s Midi-Libre newspaper said the riots had hurt France’s image abroad. “Even if the violence isn’t racial in origin the crisis in the suburbs brings the failure of France’s social model ... to the fore and has highlighted the country’s social sickness,” it said in a signed editorial. The Socialists accused Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy on Sunday of acting tough to increase his chances of becoming president in a 2007 election. Sarkozy has said he would throw out foreigners caught rioting.

<B>Matthew BIGG</B>

<B>EU offers France 50 million euros for problems in suburbs</B>

The European Union has offered France 50 million euros ($ 58.5 million) to help it tackle problems in its suburbs that have provoked unrest, EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said on Sunday. The main challenge facing France in dealing with impoverished suburbs was to create youth employment, Barroso said in a radio interview. “The biggest problem is unemployment. The best social politics is to create employment. That is the main thing. When you have 60 percent of youths unemployed in suburbs it is a problem,” Barroso told Europe 1 radio. France has faced 17 consecutive nights of violence in the suburbs of major towns and cities by youths protesting at harsh police treatment, unemployment and lack of opportunities. White youths as well as people of sub-Saharan African and north African origin have burned thousands of cars as part of the riots centred in poor housing estates and suburbs surrounding major towns and cities.

Barroso said he had offered to make the funds available in a letter to Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin on Friday. “If the French authorities want to do this with us, it is possible to do it with a rescheduling of credits,” he said. The unrest is the worst in France for almost 40 years and has shocked the government of President Jacques Chirac and caused ripples throughout Europe. Barroso said France was not alone in struggling to find ways of integrating its immigrant population because the problem occurred in many European cities.