Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin said in an interview broadcast today that the civil unrest that recently shook France could strike other countries, and called the spread of violence a "new phenomenon of globalisation."
In an interview with CNN, Mr de Villepin said France's response to the unrest that engulfed depressed suburbs must come "very, very fast." "It is an emergency matter," he said.
"What happened in France can happen, of course, as well in other countries - in Europe or elsewhere. It is part of a new phenomenon of globalisation."
The violence that started on October 27 and lasted for three weeks was France's worst civil unrest since student-worker protests in 1968.
Youths, mostly from housing projects in France's poor suburbs, set fire to some 9,000 vehicles over three weeks of arson attacks, rioting and other unrest that prompted Mr de Villepin's government to declare a state of emergency, allowing the use of curfews and other measures to stop the mayhem.
At the height of the unrest, youths burned more than 1,408 vehicles across France in one night, and shots were fired at police. The violence prompted collective soul-searching about France's failure to integrate its African and Muslim minorities.
Anger about high unemployment and discrimination fanned frustration among the French-born children of immigrants who took part in the riots. In response, President Jacques Chirac's conservative government has announced speeded-up spending to improve low-income housing, education and employment, among a range of new measures.
Mr Chirac and many of his top ministers are opposed to any official policy of affirmative action or the setting of quotas to help racial minorities.
Mr De Villepin reiterated that stance, saying that France's goal was not to target minorities with preferential treatment but to help all people who need it.
"In our republic, everybody is equal and we don't want to take into account the colour of skin or the religion," he said. "Everyone who has a difficulty is going to be taken into account and helped individually."
Mr De Villepin said the government plans to triple the scholarships it gives to needy youths and increase the number of schooling opportunities for top students from underprivileged neighbourhoods by opening spots for them in boarding schools.
Over the next month, Mr de Villepin said that representatives from France's national employment agency would meet with "all the young people" in depressed neighbourhoods to propose either a job, an internship or a training programme.
AP