France introduces emergency curfew measures

In a desperate move to halt the violence which has swept France over the past 12 days, France's Cabinet authorized curfews under a state-of-emergency law.

Local officials "will be able to impose curfews on the areas where this decision applies," President Jacques Chirac announced. "It is necessary to accelerate the return to calm."

As there is an initial 12-day limit to state of emergency, Chirac said that the Cabinet will meet again later this week to allow for a possible extension of the curfews beyond that time.

"We will watch how events develop to see how it might be applied in a targeted way on an area of the country," Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy said, stressing that it was a sign of the government's "firmness, coolness and level-headedness."

1,500 police and gendarme reservists are to be deployed as reinforcements for 8,000 officers already on the ground.

Army intervention has, for the mean time, been ruled out.