[Marxism] Russian CP Sees Massive European Riots on the Horizon

["Calvin Broadbent" <calvinbroadbent@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

<http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/index.ssf?/base/news-3/1131429991166500.xml&coll=1>

European nations fear they could be next
Tuesday, November 08, 2005
BY VICTOR L. SIMPSON
Associated Press
ROME -- Europeans have watched with trepidation as rioting that began in the
suburbs of Paris has spread across France, wondering if the ghettoes in
their big cities will face similar violence from immigrant populations.

Cars were set ablaze outside Brussels' main train station and in a working
class district of Berlin, although officials in Belgium and Germany
yesterday sought to play down the risk of the kind of violence that France
has experienced since Oct. 27.

There was rioting last month in the central English city of Birmingham,
sparked by tensions between members of the Afro-Caribbean and South Asian
communities over the alleged rape of a 14-year-old black girl by an Asian
man.

Abdelkarim Carrasco, a leader of Spain's estimated 1 million-member Muslim
community, said the French experience poses a key test for Europe.

"Either Europe develops and supports the idea of a mixed culture, or Europe
has no future," he said. "Europe has to learn from what the United States
has done. It is a country that has taken in people from all over the world."

The French situation was particularly explosive because of the grim public
housing projects packed with immigrants in the suburbs of Paris. Many of
these people, French citizens from Arab or African countries, complain of
discrimination and a lack of good jobs.

In contrast, even though some of Berlin's neighborhoods are predominantly
Turkish, they are not in high-rises and Germans still live in the
neighborhood. Immigrants in Rome are spread around the city, with many
living near the train station in the center of the city; many take jobs
Italians no longer want to do.

Nevertheless, officials across the continent who have been grappling in
recent years with an often uncontrolled flow of poor, mainly Muslim
immigrants acknowledge that poor integration and poverty posed threats.

"There are terrible living conditions and unhappiness, (even) where
everybody is Italian," said Romano Prodi, the center-left's candidate to
oppose Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi in elections next spring. In a
newspaper interview, Prodi said poverty, unemployment and urban decay could
spark violence in Italy.

Foreign Minister Gianfranco Fini, a Berlusconi ally, shot back that Prodi's
remarks caused unnecessary alarm.

In Germany, Wolfgang Schaeuble, a conservative tapped as
Chancellor-designate Angela Merkel's interior minister, told the Bild daily
newspaper that the conditions in France were different from those in
Germany.

"We don't have these gigantic high-rise projects that they have on the edges
of French cities," he said. Schaeuble cautioned, however, that "we have to
improve integration, particularly of young people. That means above all that
they must master the German language."

An immigration law that took effect in January aims to integrate newcomers
to Germany, making German-language and civics courses obligatory for them.

Others, however, saw the rioting in low-income Paris suburbs as evidence
that European immigration policies don't work.

Heinz-Christian Strache, leader of Austria's rightist, xenophobic Freedom
Party, called on Austrian leaders to stop immigration and implement
integration measures that would prevent "French conditions" from emerging in
his country.

Russian Communist Party chief Gennady Zyuganov said Russia could see similar
rioting, "but on an even greater scale and with even more dramatic
consequences."

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