(Nouméa) The French state launched a vast law enforcement operation on Sunday in its South Pacific archipelago of New Caledonia to clear the road to the airport on Sunday, after six deaths in six days of riots against a electoral reform.
This operation “with more than 600 gendarmes” aims “to regain complete control of the 60 km main road between Nouméa and the airport”, announced the French Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin in a message on X.
Especially since New Zealand announced on Sunday that it had asked France to be able to land planes in order to repatriate its nationals.
“We are ready to take off, and are awaiting authorization from the French authorities to know when these flights can take place safely,” Foreign Minister Winston Peters said in a statement.
More than 3,000 people stranded
In the absence of flights to and from New Caledonia, suspended since Tuesday, the government of the archipelago estimated on Saturday that 3,200 people were stranded, either because they could not leave the archipelago or because they could not join him.
PHOTO DELPHINE MAYEUR, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Police officers in riot gear are seen outside a police station in Nouméa on May 18.
The violence left six dead, the latest on Saturday afternoon, a Caldoche (Caledonian of European origin) in Kaala-Gomen, in the North province. The other five dead are two gendarmes and three Kanak civilians, in the Nouméa metropolitan area.
In a press release on Sunday morning, the High Commission of the Republic in New Caledonia, however, reported a “calmer” night.
“The State is mobilizing to ensure the protection of the population and reestablish republican order,” added the representation of the central State. She announced the upcoming arrival of “several hundred internal security, logistical and operational support and civil security forces”, in addition to the reinforcements already sent, she recalled.
Regaining control by force should be a long-term task for the police. The violence in some neighborhoods every night shows that the rioters remain very determined.
“The reality is that there is […] lawless areas […] which are held by armed bands, independence bands, the CCAT. And in these places, they destroy everything,” said the vice-president of the Southern province of New Caledonia, Philippe Blaise, on BFMTV on Saturday.
The Field Action Coordination Cell (CCAT) is a radical independence organization accused of inciting greater violence.
Nouméa “besieged”
New example of unrest during the night from Saturday to Sunday: according to the public television channel Nouvelle-Calédonie La 1Dthe media library in the Rivière salée district of Nouméa was set on fire.
Questioned by AFP, Nouméa town hall responded on Sunday morning that it had “no way at the moment to verify it, as the neighborhood is inaccessible”.
PHOTO DELPHINE MAYEUR, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
People queue to buy groceries at a supermarket along a street blocked by debris and burned items following nighttime unrest in the Magenta district of Noumea on May 18.
The mayor of Nouméa, Sonia Lagarde (Renaissance), estimated on BFMTV on Saturday that the situation was “far from a return to appeasement”. “Can we say that we are in a city under siege? Yes, I think we can say that,” she added.
The exceptional measures of the state of emergency are maintained, namely the curfew between 6 p.m. and 6 a.m. (7 a.m. and 3 p.m. Eastern time), the ban on gatherings, the transport of weapons and of the sale of alcohol, and the banning of the TikTok application.
For the population, traveling, buying basic necessities and seeking healthcare becomes more difficult every day. Fewer and fewer businesses are able to open, and the numerous obstacles to traffic increasingly complicate the logistics of supplying them, especially in the most disadvantaged neighborhoods.
On Sunday morning, the Southern province, which accounts for nearly two-thirds of the population, announced that all schools would remain closed during the week.
The French authorities hope that the state of emergency in force since Thursday will reduce the violence, which began on Monday after a mobilization against an electoral reform contested by representatives of the indigenous Kanak people, who fear a reduction in their electoral weight.
Without making a direct link with the violence, Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin accused Azerbaijan of interference in New Caledonia, with Baku denouncing “unfounded” accusations.
French senator Claude Malhuret, rapporteur of a commission of inquiry into TikTok, banned on the archipelago due to the riots, estimated that we should no longer fear “interference from China” which “wants to be in its own backyard”. square in the China Sea but also preponderant in the Pacific. “It needs nickel to produce its batteries,” he explained in an interview with AFP, referring to the raw ore of which the archipelago holds 20 to 30% of the world’s resources.