PARIS: Two people died and hundreds were arrested in France overnight as football fans celebrated Paris Saint-Germain’s stunning Champions League final victory, the interior ministry said on Sunday.
The epicentre of the euphoria was in Paris, which was a theatre of car horns, cheers, singing in the street and fireworks throughout the night following PSG’s 5-0 triumph over Inter Milan in Munich.
The ministry said 491 people were arrested in the capital when crowds converged on the Champs-Elysees avenue and clashes broke out with officers.
Across France as a whole, including Paris, a total of 559 people were arrested, it added.
The two deaths occurred as the celebrations took place.
A man riding a motor scooter in Paris died after being hit by a car in the city’s southern 15th arrondissement located just a couple of kilometres (1.3 miles) away from the Champs-Elysees.
In the southwestern town of Dax, a 17-year-old boy was fatally stabbed at a gathering feting the PSG victory, prosecutors said.
His death occurred shortly after the match and “during the celebrations”, but the prosecutor’s office said it did not know whether it was related to the Champions League final. It added that the perpetrator was “on the run”.
The PSG team were to hold a victory parade on the Champs-Elysees on Sunday, with tens of thousands of supporters expected to gather to catch a glimpse of their returning heroes.
Overnight, though, AFP journalists saw police on the famed thoroughfare using a water cannon to stop a crowd reaching the Arc de Triomphe that sits at the top of the Champs-Elysees.
“Troublemakers on the Champs-Elysees were looking to create incidents and repeatedly came into contact with police by throwing large fireworks and other objects,” police said in a statement.
Elsewhere, police said a car careered into fans celebrating PSG’s win in Grenoble in southeastern France, leaving four people injured, two of them seriously. All of those hurt were from the same family, police said.
The driver handed himself in to the police and was placed under arrest. A source close to the investigation said it was believed the driver had not acted intentionally.
The public prosecutor’s office said the driver had tested negative for alcohol and drugs.
