On the same day Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo threatened Fox News with a lawsuit for its depiction of “no-go zones” in the city, France’s prime minister admitted to journalists that he sees “territorial, social and ethnic apartheid” — areas of the country that resemble ethnic and social ghettos, not fitting in with French society.

Prime Minister Manuel Valls’ use of the word “apartheid” on Tuesday further pried open the touchy debate over the country’s tolerance toward Muslims and those from other cultures.

Valls spoke of the “ills that plague our country,” calling them a “social misery” that France must confront after letting them simmer too long.

Hidalgo, meanwhile, told CNN she is fed up with the false portrayal of her city and that she has no choice but to sue Rupert Murdoch’s TV network for its depiction of certain neighbourhoods as being dominated by Muslims practising Sharia law, who ignore French societal rules and who are ignored by authorities.

“When we’re insulted ... then I think we’ll have to sue, I think we’ll have to go to court, in order to have these words removed,” Hidalgo told Christiane Amanpour. “The image of Paris has been prejudiced, and the honour of Paris has been prejudiced.”

Fox has apologized more than once since the comments were made by a guest last week and has retracted its story.

In a statement, Fox’s executive vice president of news, Michael Clemente, said while they “empathize” with French citizens as they go through a healing process, they find “the mayor’s comments regarding a lawsuit misplaced.”

Valls’ words struck a chord after Paris was rocked by a series of terrorist attacks nearly two weeks ago. The attacks left 17 people dead along with the three gunmen, two of whom claimed to be tied to Al Qaeda and the third with the Islamic State.

There are about 6.5 million Muslims living in France, a country of 65 million. Since the 2008 global economic meltdown, the country has struggled with recession and high unemployment rates while absorbing many newcomers from the Middle East and North Africa. The migrants come in search of a better life but many struggle in their new-found country.

Brothers Chérif and Saïd Kouachi, raised as orphans, were born in France but fell under the influence of radical Islam. They were responsible for the massacre inside the Charlie Hebdo editorial office on Jan. 7. Amedy Coulibaly, the gunman who killed a female police officer and then went on to kill four Jewish shoppers in a kosher grocery store, was also born in France.

The New York Times reports both Chérif Kouachi and Coulibaly met Djamel Beghal, a jihadist who trained in one of Osama bin Laden’s camps in Afghanistan, in a French prison.

There is no question, France must do a better job of integrating its citizens, Valls said.

“There are daily discriminations because one doesn’t have the right name, the right skin colour or because one is a woman. We must fight this terrible feeling that there could (be) second-class citizens with less of a say than others,” Valls said.

The University of Ottawa’s Raphaël Canet, of the school of international development and global studies, has researched extensively the riots and civil unrest in the French suburbs in 2005. He agreed there are some areas that are dangerous for the French police.

“There are parts of France, some suburbs, where the police can’t go alone. It is a big problem for the state. It has been a problem for many years. Not just for Paris but for Lyons and Marseilles,” Canet said in an interview.

The problem is the lack of integration into French society. The poor are immigrants and many are Muslims and children of Algerians from the old colonies of France. Algeria waged a bloody war of independence against France in the 1950s until 1962.

“This generation is born in France. They are not strangers. They are socialized in France. But again, the French model of integration gives them no future or opportunity to get jobs,” Canet said. “The French education is failing them. They aren’t getting jobs. They aren’t feeling like they are part of French society.”

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

But with the rise of radicalism and terror events like Charlie Hebdo, “the debates have come to the forefront,” he added.

With files from Bloomberg, Star wire services.

Read more about: