Two persons have been confirmed dead, while many others were injured in France as football fans celebrated Paris Saint-Germain’s (PSG) stunning Champions League final victory.
The country’s interior ministry disclosed this on Sunday.
PSG thrashed Inter Milan 5-0 to win the Champions League title for the first time in Munich, Germany, on Saturday night.
The French capital erupted with flares and fireworks, car horns and an Eiffel Tower glittering in blue and red to celebrate PSG’s first Champions League title on Saturday.
The interior ministry said 491 people were arrested in Paris 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, the ministry added.
It stated that 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.
PSG whip Inter Milan 5-0 to win Champions League for first time
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”.
In addition to the two deaths, a police officer has been placed in an induced coma in the Normandy region after being injured by fireworks during the celebrations, police sources told AFP on Sunday.
“An investigation has been opened for intentional violence against a person in a position of public authority,” said Gauthier Poupeau, a public prosecutor for the northwestern town of Coutances.
According to initial findings, the officer was struck in the eye after a firework went off accidentally, a police source said.
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.
“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.
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