Paris police announced Wednesday that there are no plans to bring curfew in central Paris, while seven other departments in the Paris region also announced not to take curfews in their prefectures.

"The prefect of police will put them (emergency measures) in place if the situation requires it," said a Paris police spokesman.

The Paris region is on the list of areas where a state of emergency has been decreed since Nov.9, 2005.

Under the 1955 emergency powers law, invoked Tuesday by the cabinet as the toughest response to nearly two weeks of unrest in some 300 French cities, where more than 6,000 cars were torched and more than 1,500 arrests were made, local government officials, or prefects, have been given the power to declare curfews if they judge them necessary.

Under the law, they can "forbid the movement of people and vehicles in places and times fixed by decree" and ban "meetings likely to provoke or fuel disorder".

According to the spokesman, the centre of the city has been relatively spared, with the worst trouble on Saturday night when 32 cars were burned and 30 people arrested and there have been since then "between 10 and 20 cars burned" in the capital per night.

Paris' police and transport police remain on high alert to head off trouble in the city and to spot gangs of youths who may decide to travel in from the suburbs by bus or train, officials said.

A number of web-logs have been identified that urge rioters to descend on landmarks such as the Champs-Elysees and the Eiffel Tower, but there was no sign that these had been heeded, officials said.

Meanwhile seven other departments in the Paris region: Hauts-de- Seine, Seine-Saint-Denis,Val-de-Marne, Essonne, Val d'Oise, Yvelines and Seine-et-Marne also announced not to take curfews.

Source: Xinhua