PARIS: French police are reporting another 26 arrests overnight in further unrest in suburban Paris towns rocked by arson attacks and other violence following the alleged rape of a young black man by police.
The violence in the Saint-Seine-Denis region, a working class region northeast of the French capital with a large minority population, erupted after a 22-year-old man was allegedly sodomized with a police officer's baton during an identity check last week.
One officer was charged Sunday with aggravated rape and three others were charged with aggravated assault. The officers deny the allegations.
Authorities are wary of unrest in France's poor towns, remembering the fiery 2005 riots that spread through France beginning in the Saint-Denis town of Clichy-Sous-Bois, and hopscotching through social housing around the country