A 14-year-old boy has died after being struck by a car amid scattered incidents of violence in several French cities after France’s World Cup semi-final victory over Morocco on Wednesday night, local authorities have said.
The local government office in the southern city of Montpellier said police were searching for the driver of the car, which was abandoned nearby after the “violent collision” and was being examined for fingerprints and other evidence.
The unnamed boy was taken to hospital but died shortly afterwards, the Hérault département said. Witnesses said the driver had driven off at high speed, hitting two adolescents, after fans tried to seize the French flag flying from his car window.
The mayor of Montpellier, Michaël Delafosse, said he was “deeply dismayed” by the incident, which reportedly happened less than an hour after France qualified for their second successive World Cup final by beating Morocco 2-0.
While post-match celebrations were generally peaceful, a total of 262 people were arrested nationwide, with incidents in cities including Marseille, Avignon, Annecy, Grenoble, Lyon, Nice, Bordeaux and Paris, police and local authorities said.
More than 165 were detained in the greater Paris region, including 145 in the capital itself, where an estimated 25,000 fans gathered on the Champs-Élysées. Five police officers suffered minor injuries, mainly from fireworks, authorities said.
Among those arrested in Paris were a group of about 40 far-right activists, several of whom were already known to police, who were stopped by a police patrol and detained for conspiracy to commit violence and possession of banned weapons.
“They were clearly heading towards the Champs-Élysées looking for trouble,” a police source told Libération newspaper. A police union spokesperson, Stanislas Gaudon, told RMC radio that overall the evening had been “relatively quiet” with the exception of “a few outbreaks of violence in Paris that were quickly brought under control”.
