Grandmother of slain French teenager begs for calm: ‘Stop and do not riot’

The grandmother of a teenager who was shot dead by police in France issued a plea on Sunday to maintain calm and stop the riots, France24 reported.

The French teenager whose fatal shooting by police sparked massive unrest in the European nation. His grandmother issued a plea telling people to "stop and do not riot".

"I tell the people who are rioting this: Do not smash windows, attack schools or buses. Stop! It's the mums who are taking the bus, it's the mums who walk outside," the grandmother, Nadia, told BFM television, according to France24.

Earlier today, the mayor of a Paris suburb said his home was attacked and termed the incident "an assassination attempt" on his family, CNN reported.

"At 1:30 a.m., while I was at the city hall like the past three nights, individuals rammed their car upon my residence before setting fire to it to burn my house, inside which my wife and my two young children slept," said Mayor Vincent Jeanbrun of L'Hay-les-Roses, a commune in the southern suburbs of Paris.

Protests have erupted in France after the death of 17-year-old Nahel Merzouk, who was shot by a police officer in Nanterre earlier this week. The funeral of Nahel Merzouk took place at a mosque in Nanterre on Saturday amid heavy security presence.

The death of Nahel Merzouk has sparked a debate on policing in France's marginalised communities and raised questions on whether race played a role in his death, the CNN report said.

The officer who is accused of shooting him was taken to jail. Nahel Merzouk's mother Mounia while speaking to television station France 5 on Friday blamed only the officer who shot her son for his death.

In order to control the protests, the French government has deployed security personnel and riot police across the country as the unrest continued into a sixth night of protests.

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