France's Champions League celebrations turn violent as two fans dead, one police officer in coma
Two fans died and a police officer is in a coma after mass nationwide celebrations for Paris Saint-Germain's historic Champions League victory, European soccer's biggest prize, French authorities said Sunday.
The fatalities marred what started as a night of exuberance after PSG clinched its first — and long-awaited — Champions League title, in a 5-0 win over Inter Milan. The Eiffel Tower glowed in team colors, and fans partied through the night in celebrations that were largely peaceful but degenerated into violence in some areas.
A 17-year-old boy was stabbed to death in the western city of Dax during a PSG street party after Saturday night's final in Munich, the national police service said. A man in his 20s was killed in Paris when his scooter was hit by a car during PSG celebrations, the interior minister's office said. The circumstances of both are being investigated.
A police officer was hit accidentally by fireworks at a PSG gathering in Coutances in northwest France and placed in an artificial coma because of grave eye injuries, the national police service said. A total of 192 people were injured around the capital, four of them seriously, the Paris police chief said.
The team is expected to return to a big victory parade on the Champs-Elysees on Sunday afternoon, with up to 110,000 people allowed along the iconic, tree-lined avenue to see the victorious players.
Later, the team will join fans packed into PSG's home stadium, the Parc des Princes, on the city's western edge, for a concert and light show and official presentation of the Champions League trophy.
A wide swath of central Paris was closed to traffic for the exceptional day. The security measures are also impacting the French Open unfolding nearby.
Thousands of police are being deployed to keep order, and will employ similar tactics as they did Saturday night, Paris police chief Laurent Nunez told reporters. AP reporters saw tear gas used near the stadium and and water cannons used near the Arc de Triomphe to disperse rowdy crowds.
In addition to the injuries and arrests, Nunez said four stores were looted overnight. Firefighters were so busy extinguishing garbage can fires in the middle of celebrations and dealing with other emergencies that the fire hotline was saturated.
By 2 a.m. Sunday, a total of 294 arrests had been made, including 30 people who broke into a shoe shop on the Champs-Élysées. Two cars were set alight close to Parc des Princes, police added.
At the Place de la Bastille, there were joyous scenes as fans climbed onto the base of the famous column, singing, dancing and letting off flares, while those around joined in.
At one point, motorbikes loudly revved their engines and the crowd cheered as they did laps around the column. There were no police nearby and, by 1 a.m., the atmosphere was upbeat with no tensions and plenty of singing.
Nunez blamed the scattered troubles on ″thousands of people who came to commit acts of violence″ instead of watching the match. He noted similar unrest on the sidelines of prior celebrations in the capital, such as after France's World Cup win in 2018.
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