Dan Martin is closing in on Ireland’s best overall result at the Tour de France since his uncle Stephen Roche won the race 30 years ago — but he will not emulate him by claiming the yellow jersey.

SMALL, mobile groups of youths hit Paris’s riot-shaken suburbs with waves of arson attacks, torching hundreds of cars, as unrest entered its second week yesterday and spread to other towns in France.

Small, mobile groups of youths torched hundreds more cars near Paris today, and the violence and arson attacks that have shaken the capital’s suburbs for a week spread to other French towns.

Prosecutors are questioning two more suspects who they said displayed “bizarre behaviour” in the French Riviera where forest fires believed to have been started deliberately killed four people, including two British people.