Paris: PSG Champions League celebrations erupt into chaos

In France, crowds have gone on the rampage after football team Paris Saint-Germain won the Champions League final. Fan revelry turned into violent riots, leaving at least two people dead and a police officer in a coma. The violence has soured. Saturday's historic win in which PSG beat Inter Milan 5-0. It was a night of sporting dreams for the supporters of Paris Saint-Germain after their team took home the biggest prize in European football. 5-0. We managed the defense. We played very good in offense. We scored five goals. Inter Milan did nothing. Too bad. They did nothing. We are champions. The game was so great. 5-0. We can't dream for better. The ambience was so good and to see Marquinhos crying was so beautiful. The city's most iconic landmark, the Eiffel Tower, was illuminated in the team's colours as fans celebrated the win. But on the streets of the French capital, revelry quickly turned to tragedy when a woman was killed after being hit by a car. And in southwestern France, a 17-year-old was stabbed to death at a victory celebration. More than 5,000 police were deployed across the city after the game. They used water cannons and pepper spray in an attempt to control the crowds after flares and fireworks were set off and property was damaged amid the wild celebrations. Police said that at least 200 cars were torched, including close to Paris Saint-Germain's and that almost 600 were arrested, most of whom were suspected of causing disorder or possessing fireworks. France's interior minister called those causing damage barbarians. And earlier, the journalist Anne-Elisabeth Moutet, who witnessed the riots yesterday in Paris, told us what she saw and what caused the clashes with the police. I saw, and I saw literally from my windows because I live very close to the Champs-Elysees, where there was the largest fan zone in the city. Essentially, young people who had come prepared, who had come with things that exploded, which are, we call them mortiers, but basically they are far beyond toys for children. They had come with weapons of aggression. They were out of control. Some of them were drunk, but not all of them. And they burnt cars. They destroyed shops in my street this morning. Everybody has a hangover because the windows have been broken, even though many of the shops and basement and ground floor windows were blocked off with plywood. And it looks like not the scene of a celebration. It looks like a scene of, by best sort of comparison, is the tail end of the yellow vests movement a few years back. And they were groups of people who had come specifically prepared and armed for this. Well, let's go to France now and Daniel Brown, journalist, editorial coordinator at HEC Paris is joining us now. Great to have you on the show. So after all the violence we saw last night, what was the atmosphere like at the welcome parade today? The mood was really electric. It was a far cry from some of the things that we saw yesterday, although I think one shouldn't exaggerate the violence that was there. It was mainly a small minority and skirmishes and a lot of material damage. Today, it was full of flags and chants and flares, but also a heavy police presence, somewhat aggressive, preventing a lot of the fans from getting anywhere near the parade itself. So there was something like 100,000 fans actually along the Champs-Élysées. But you could probably double, maybe more, the number that were in the streets adjacent who just could not reach anywhere near the avenue. But a lot of families, a lot of youth, a lot of chants that have gone throughout Europe since PSG has managed this wonderful campaign. All right. Yeah, it's important to speak about, obviously, the celebrations, but it is important as well to speak about the violence that did see two people die in separate incidents. What more is known about the reasons for this violence? Well, in general, there's a bit of a culture of violence that goes back before, you know, in 2013 was one of the most violent incidents. So before the Macron government, it was already a known reality. 2013 was the last time that PSG ever celebrated any kind of titles that it won, and it's won several outside of the Parc des Princes stadium. This is the first time it's done so. And I think that, yeah, there is this mixture of taunting and aggressive police that are sort of feeding off each other, unfortunately, which has brought a lot of material damage. You can hear the sirens behind me at the moment. It's still not over. But it's, I think, not just confined to the French or to the Parisians. No, but other countries have taken measures, for example, to take to deal with violence in football. Is that the case in France? They oh, yeah, there certainly have been attempts to curtail it. And there's been a very aggressive political approach as well. The minister of the interior yesterday calling this kind of behaviour savage, barbarians, which other politicians are saying is actually feeding into a rather aggressive approach. But it's the actual formal measures are going to be revised, I think, in the light of these latest incidents. Great to speak to you today, Daniel. Daniel Brown, thanks for your reporting from Paris. Thank you.