Paris ? France’s national police chief said Sunday that the country’s worst rioting since the 1960s seemed to be nearing an end, but violence persisted into the night, with at least two schools set on fire and dozens of cars torched.

In scattered attacks overnight into today, vandals rammed a car into a primary school in the southern city of Toulouse before setting the building on fire and burned cars in northeastern Strasbourg. In northern France, arsonists set fire to a sports center in the suburb of Faches-Thumesnil and a school in the town of Halluin.

The rioting, sparked by the accidental electrocution deaths of two teens who thought police were chasing them, began in Paris’ poor suburbs.

Sunday was the 18th straight night of unrest, but the storm of arson attacks and other violence has lost steam since the government declared a state of emergency on Wednesday.

The number of cars burned nightly has steadily decreased – from 502 overnight into Saturday, to 374 overnight into Saturday, to 208 as Monday began. A week earlier, 1,400 cars were incinerated in a single night.