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THE French government has been accused of hiding their inability to control the country’s sinister New Year’s Eve torching tradition as the interior ministry claimed the night passed “without any major incident” – but almost 1,000 cars were set on fire and destroyed.
On Sunday, the French officials chose to release a low figure of 650 destroyed cars which only indicated the vehicles that were “set on fire” – a figure which did not include those car that were completely destroyed and engulfed in ensuing flames.
But the official figures revealed a 17 per cent rise since last year’s arson attacks, as a total of 945 parked cars were torched during the terrifying tradition.
Pierre Henry Brandet, a spokesman for the French interior ministry, said: “Once again this year, the overall number of vehicles burned demonstrates that, however intolerable, the phenomenon is contained”.
In reality, 454 people were arrested by police throughout the night of New Year’s Eve and 301 of them were taken into custody.
Marine Le Pen’s National Front far-right party immediately condemned the French government for providing the figures that were “extremely hazy”.