The figures include anything from physical and sexual violence, robbery and assaults, signalling that safety in Paris has become critical issue. As BFMTV reported on Tuesday, October 15, the deliberate physical attacks (35 343 in the capital between January 1 and September 30, is an increase of 9,08 percent over one year) and property damage (+ 13,91 percent) increased significantly compared to the first nine months of 2018.
Non-malicious physical violence (+ 9,84 percent) and threats (+ 14,20 percent) also increased. At the same time, sexual violence increased by 3,25 percent over one year.
In an interview with BFMTV, the Deputy (PS) in charge of the Security of the Mayor of Paris, Colombe Brossel, said she was worried by these new figures, “which are worse than a few months ago. All the facts of daily crime explode whether it concerns the indicators of burglary, robbery, thefts with violence … They are all above 15 percent, or even beyond that. It should be noted that delinquency is prevalent in many of the capital’s arrondissements”.
There is no area in Paris currently that has escaped rising crime. “It’s difficult in the west and east of the capital,” Mayor Anne Hidalgo’s assistant explained.
Faced with this worrying situation, the Paris City Hall “calls for reinforcements of the police force. As deterence, it takes people on the street. Priority must be given to combating everyday crime. Security in Paris is public order and daily security,” added Colombe Brossel.
Residents of the heavily migrant-populated 18th arrondissement of Paris feel abandoned by authorities.
According to Le Figaro, annoying behaviour (-6.47 percent over one year) as well as disturbing behavior (-12.04 percent) have however declined.
Meanwhile, in an article published by Le Monde, several celebrities have called for tolerance, demanding that Emmanuel Macron say that “Muslims have their place in our society”.
On Tuesday 15 October, 90 French personalities asked the French president to say “stop the hatred against the Muslims of France”. More specifically, they demanded that condemnation of those who had complained about a veiled woman in the National Assembly in Dijon. Among the signatories are artists, sociologists and journalists.
The various artists and “intellectuals” believe that “this scene, these words, this behavior are of an incredible violence and hatred” but “by our cowardice, by our renunciations, we contributed, little by little, to allow them, to accept them”. They said noting about rising crime in the multicultural capital.
The signatories asked the head of state “to say, firmly, that Muslim women, wearing headscarves or not, and Muslims in general have their place in our society”. According to them, “the future of our country is at stake”.
These different personalities also mentioned that the University of Cergy had asked its staff to detect “weak signals of radicalization”. According to the signatories, “the extreme right has made hatred against Muslims a major tool of its propaganda, but it does not have a monopoly on doing so. Members of the so-called republican right and left do not hesitate to stigmatize Muslims, often ‘in the name of secularism'”.
