Sarkozy holidays as fresh violence hits French cities

PARIS: France's president-elect Nicolas Sarkozy relaxed on Tuesday on a yacht in the Mediterranean ahead of launching his radical reform programme, while back home "anti-Sarko" protestors burned cars and clashed with police in cities across the country.   

Sarkozy boarded the yacht in Malta with his wife Cecilia and their 10-year-old son Louis on Monday at the start of a three-day break, far from the hectic post-election atmosphere in Paris.   

The family arrived on the island on a private plane after the 52-year-old right-winger's election victory on Sunday. He won 53 per cent of the votes to 47 per cent for his Socialist rival Segolene Royal.   

Sarkozy had pre-planned the break to recover from his gruelling campaigning and to mentally ready himself for France's highest office. He takes over from President Jacques Chirac on May 16.    

In his last major public ceremony as head of state, Chirac on Tuesday laid a wreath at the tomb of the unknown soldier in Paris to commemorate the Allied defeat of Nazi Germany in 1945.   

Sarkozy's election triumph has sparked protests across the country, many of them violent. They began late Sunday and continued Monday night, prompting the leader of the defeated Socialists to appeal for calm.

Overnight on Monday, some 500 youths shouting "Sarko, fascist!" went on a rampage in the Bastille district of Paris, burning 10 cars, looting two stores and smashing windows, police said.   

More than 200 people were detained during four hours of clashes in which protesters threw stones and other projectiles at police, one of whom was injured. Fifteen people remained in custody on Tuesday.   

The flare-ups echoed Royal's pre-poll warning that a Sarkozy victory could see the country slide into unrest.   

Sarkozy, a tough-talking former interior minister, is hated in the high-immigrant suburbs after he described young delinquents as "rabble" and for his stance on law and order.   

It was under his watch that the suburbs across France exploded into riots for three weeks in late 2005, in which hundreds of buildings were burned and thousands of cars torched.   

Anti-Sarkozy protests turned violent overnight Monday in France's second city of Lyon, in Lille, Toulouse, Nantes and Rennes. More than 500 cars were set alight in cities nationwide.   

Socialist Party leader Francois Hollande appealed for calm, warning that the violence could trigger a heavy police clampdown.   

"Those who are waging this violence are playing into the hands of those who want more order, who want to be tougher," he told RTL radio.   

Sarkozy will have a busy schedule when he begins his ambitious bid to overhaul France's lacklustre economy. He has vowed to cut taxes for the wealthy, trim unemployment and curb the power of the country's powerful unions.

 Before that he must name a prime minister. The Financial Times, citing unnamed British government sources, reported Tuesday that he told British Prime Minister Tony Blair on Sunday he intended to pick former social affairs minister Francois Fillon.    

Sarkozy is expected to move fast to enact his reforms. He is banking on a clear majority for his Union for a Popular Movement (UMP) party in parliamentary elections in June, after which he is to call a special session of the National Assembly to vote through the first stage of his programme.   

That programme includes the abolition of tax on overtime, deep cuts in inheritance tax, a law guaranteeing minimum service in transport strikes, and rules to oblige the unemployed to take up offered work.   

On the social front he has pledged minimum jail terms for serial offenders and tougher rules to make it harder for immigrants to bring extended families to France.