France celebrates Bastille Day with extra police to prevent new unrest

Alphajets of the Patrouille de France fly over the Champs-Elysees (AP Photo/Christophe Ena)

France has celebrated its national holiday with soaring warplanes and a grand Bastille Day parade in Paris — and with more than 100,000 police deployed around the country to prevent a new outbreak of unrest in underprivileged neighbourhoods.

The celebrations marking the start of the French Revolution on July 14 1789 came after the nation’s most serious rioting for nearly 20 years, following the fatal police shooting of a teenager with North African roots that laid bare anger over entrenched inequality and racial discrimination.