The Minister of the Interior welcomed the “serene climate” of the Night of New Year’s night on Sunday and the “historic decrease” of the number of burnt down vehicles.
Mo12345lemonde with AFP
The Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, reported, Sunday 1 er January, the absence of “notable incident” during the New Year’s night, adding that the number of burned cars had decreased by 20 %. This “historical decrease” of burned cars is explained according to Mr. Darmanin by “the very important presence of gendarmes and police”, twelve months after a new year “where there had already been less burned vehicles”.
In detail, 690 vehicles were burnt down, against 874 in 2022, according to press release from his ministry . This is the confirmation, for the minister, of a “tendencies” of the phenomenon – 1,316 cars had been affected in 2019.
The number of arrests increased to him: 490 people were arrested, compared to 441 in 2021, an increase of 11 %. They “wanted to shoot mortars on the police” or “wanted to set fire to cars”, some of whom to make “insurance scams”, deplored Gérald Darmanin from Mayotte, where he is visiting for two days. “The year 2022 thus becomes that when New Year’s Eve knows the least burned vehicles and the most arrests,” he summed up.
Some 90,000 police and gendarmes were mobilized for the Night of the Holy Sylvestre, against nearly 127,000 members of the police for the passage to 2022. In Paris, a million people gathered on the Champs-Elysées, where the traditional fireworks were back after two years of absence due to COVID-19.