France arrests more than 1,300 people for unrest on the eve of the funeral of a murdered teenager

Authorities in France have stepped up efforts to contain the unrest that erupted last week over the deadly police shooting of a 17-year-old, with officers arresting more than 1,300 protesters overnight, the interior ministry said.

The teenager’s family will hold a funeral for him on Saturday in Nanterre, the Parisian suburb where he lived and where a police officer killed him during a traffic stop on Tuesday.

The Interior Ministry described the overnight violence as of a “lower intensity” than in previous nights, but places like Marseille and Lyon were still gripped by unrest and clashes. Since Tuesday, many cars have been set on fire across France, buildings damaged and shops looted in some cities.

The police arrested 1,311 people overnight said the Ministry of the Interior that 79 officers were injured. More than 45,000 officers, armored vehicles and specialized police units were mobilized to quell the riots.

Many of the protesters identify with the teenager, who is named only as Nahel M. and who was of Algerian and Moroccan descent. Anger over the shooting is rooted in decades of complaints about police brutality and lingering feelings of neglect and racial discrimination in France’s poorer urban suburbs.

In the southern city of Marseille, police said they had arrested nearly 90 people overnight as protesters set fires and looted some shops. The mayor of the city, Benoit Payan, condemned the “acts of vandalism” and called on authorities to send stronger law enforcement.

Officials say the violence has been fueled by young people coordinating on social media.

On Friday night, France’s national football team – many of whom also come from working-class areas – called “the brutal death” of Nahel “unacceptable” but urged those participating in the violence to stop.

In a statement shared by Kylian Mbappé, one of the players, the team members said they shared the feelings of anger and sadness. But, they said, “Violence solves nothing,” adding that those contributing to the destruction damaged their own neighborhoods, cities and “places of fulfillment.”