France's Car Burnings: 2009 Numbers In Perspective

Back in 1999, France was rocked by the scandal brought to their attention by then-President Jacques Chirac, blasting his political rival, then-Prime Minister Lionel Jospin's government in a speech delivered at a firefighters conference: a shameful 14,000 cars were burned by youthful vandals in 1998 (the previous year), with a shocking 100 vehicles burnt on New Year's Eve alone.

This week the French newspaper Le Figaro contrasts those halcyon days with more recent incendiary statistics:

1998: 14,000 cars burned
2005: 45,588 cars burned
2006: 44,157 cars burned

2007: 46,814 cars burned

2008: 40,496 cars burned

2009: the expected final number will again exceed 40,000

Fast forward to January 2010 and current Minister of the Interior Brice Hortefeux's patting himself on the back for a "calm" New Year's Eve: only 1,137 cars set on fire, a 0.87% decrease over the previous year. (As a sardonic French commentor points out: at this rate it would take 115 years for there to be zero cars burned on New Year's Eve... ) Le Figaro puts those numbers in perspective, citing the Ministry's own figures as their source:

2004 New Year's Eve: 324 cars burned

2005 New Year's Eve: 337 cars burned

2006 New Year's Eve: 425 cars burned

2007 New Year's Eve: 397 cars burned

2008 New Year's Eve: 878 cars burned

Two factors are cited for the slight drop this year: minimal television coverage, with French tv "sober if not silent on the subject". Next, an "exceptional police presence": 45,000 police and riot squad officers mobilized for the night of December 31 2009, and 34,000 called out for the night of July 14th (Bastille Day in France), said by police unions as operating at "near maximum capacity".

Le Figaro editorializes that "the experience of the last few years shows that arson has become a banal tool for protests, of rage but also of joy. All the important events involving youth are now at risk: New Year's Eve, but also the nights of July 13 and 14 (when 500 cars were burned), soccer games (at least 300 cars burned in France as fall-out of the Egypt-Algeria match), important elections (730 cars burned the night of Nicolas Sarkozy's electoral victory in 2007). A unique phenomenon in Europe..."

... for now.

[Translated from the original French source at Le Figaro; thanks to Le Salon Beige for the story, where a commentor there remarks that these official figures do not count the vehicles that end up burning by being parked next to cars set on fire. That is a statistical detail left out of most of the english media's reporting on the story. As we reported way back in our January 2008 coverage of that year's inflammatory car burning figures, France keeps two separate sets of statistics for their auto-da-fe; as far as it's known, Dec 31st's 1,347 figure only includes the cars targeted by vandals for burning, it excludes the vehicles that caught on fire due to flames spreading to adjacent automobiles.]

UPDATE: France-watcher Tiberge carries a couple of posts at her blog this week that will be of interest to readers looking for more news on the subject of France's fiery New Year's Eve: translations of reader comments from the French mainstream media's reporting of the ritualistic arson, and a review of the unprecedented security procedures put in place that were necessary to reduce the total by only ten burned cars.

France's Fiery New Year's Eve: 1,137 Cars Burned

French government officials are patting themselves on the back this morning for a job well done: the number of cars burned on New Year's Eve dropped from last year's record total. An unprecedented national deployment of 45,000 police and riot squad troops, supported by 50,000 firefighters, succeeded in reducing the number... by ten.

On the night of December 31/January 1st, 2009, 1,147 cars were set aflame. Last night, "only" 1,137 were torched (according to early reports released this morning to the press). France's Minister of the Interior, Brice Hortefeux, states today that the "calm" New Year's Eve "went well overall throughout the whole national territory".

The increased police presence is cited as a major contribution to the "light drop" in incidents of assaults on police, firefighters and old-fashioned Parisiens, who simply want to pop champagne corks rather than molotov cocktails on their New Year's Eve. "You'd think we were at war", observes a father who had come to the Champs Elysees to celebrate 2010's arrival with his family, in the face of the cohorts of police patrolling the capital city. Estimates are that only half the number of people chose to venture out and celebrate the New Year on the streets of Paris, compared to the year before.

The scorecard: 549 arrests were made, almost doubling the 288 arrests made in 2008/09 (2007/08's event had seen 249 arrests). 16 police officers were wounded this year, compared to the four reported injuries last year.

Paris' notorious trio of troubled suburbs, Seine-Saint-Denis, Hauts-de-Seine and Val de Marne, saw a reduction in the number of car burnings in "seriously more important proportions", the Minister reported: only 198 torched automobiles, a 20% drop over last year's total. 138 arrests were made in the 'sensitive' suburbs, compared to only 41 the previous New Year's Eve.

One of the big stories connected with last year's New Year's evil was the spread of the car burning rituals from urban to rural settings, but so far the French media does not report an increase of that trend this time around. "Just like an ordinary weekend", the Bordeaux police announce this morning.

The average French citizen hardly finds the news accounts reassuring. A comment by "Hadrien" made on Le Monde's coverage of the car burnings serves as a good summary of the comments in general, a response in direct opposition to the gallic shrug of the shoulders being exhibited by French authorities:

"It's not the number of burnt cars that worries me. It's the fact that everyone finds this normal..."

[Translated from French news accounts in Le Figaro, Le Parisien and Le Monde]

Is Paris Burning?

Motoring in France? What a romance in store for you, ami. It's sooo European. As is this:

Violences urbaines : les chiffres 2007

Lu dans Minute du 6 août :

"Le nombre de « violences urbaines » commises en 2007 en France a été discrètement publié par le ministère de l'Intérieur. Il s'élève à 93 016, dont 37 359 incendies de véhicules, soit 102 par jour ! Le reste se répartit entre 26 217 incendies de poubelles, 7 955 dégradations de mobilier urbain (recensées dans la même catégorie, que celui-ci soit juste endommagé ou totalement détruit), 6 856 jets de projectile (les destinataires étant principalement les policiers et les pompiers), 5 658 rodéos automobiles et 4 101 « violences collectives à l'encontre des forces de sécurité, de secours et de santé », à distinguer des « jets de projectile » qui sont des actes individuels…"

http://lesalonbeige.blogs.com/my_weblog/2008/08/violences-urbai.html
That's translatable from French into English as something like a whole whack of cars burnt, like 102 per day par jour.

Subtle. I can't believe my eyes. How does one hide 102 burning cars every night? And mobs attacking the police? Look, it doesn't matter if they do it par jour or not, once is enough and too much. If the police cannot or will not protect themselves, what are they doing for the citizens par jour? Nada.


Europe isn't finished: If Osama Barka becomes president, Europe is just beginning. They'll come to Paris, Texas, too.