In New Caledonia, the French colonial territory, Paris’ new electoral law has provoked a reaction from the indigenous population. Accusing the French government of trying to weaken the representation of the region’s indigenous population, French law enforcement officials have launched an intensive crackdown on the locals.<\/p>\n
Three people lost their lives in the last night of violent protests. Media reports put the death toll at four.<\/p>\n
New Caledonia, located between Australia and Fiji, is one of the few French territories stretching from the Caribbean and Indian Ocean to the Pacific that remains part of post-colonial France.<\/p>\n
In a statement on the actions of the people of New Caledonia, the French Presidency said: “The President of the Republic deeply regrets the death of three people and the serious injury of a gendarme. All acts of violence are unacceptable and will be combated relentlessly to ensure the return of republican order,” it said.<\/p>\n
State of emergency declared<\/strong><\/p>\n President Emmanuel Macron has called an emergency meeting of the French National Defence Committee to discuss the situation and propose the declaration of a state of emergency in New Caledonia.<\/p>\n Macron has asked the French prime minister and interior minister to invite representatives from New Caledonia to Paris to reach an agreement.<\/p>\n France also declared a state of emergency today after sending troops to New Caledonia’s ports and international airport.<\/p>\n The emergency measures give the authorities more powers to tackle the rebellion that has gripped New Caledonia.<\/p>\n Additional powers under the state of emergency include house arrest, searches, confiscation of weapons and restrictions on the movement of people deemed to pose a threat to public order.<\/p>\n The last time France used such measures in one of its overseas territories was in 1985, also in New Caledonia, according to the Interior Ministry.<\/p>\n Prime Minister Attal: Violence will not be tolerated<\/strong><\/p>\n “Violence of any kind will not be tolerated,” said Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, adding that the state of emergency “will allow us to use great means to restore order”.<\/p>\n Attal told a crisis meeting that troops had been deployed to secure ports and the international airport, and that the government’s representative in New Caledonia had “banned TikTok”.<\/p>\n The airport, where the troops were deployed, was closed to international flights.<\/p>\n “Dozens of rebels have been arrested and will be tried,” the French High Commission in New Caledonia said in a statement early on Wednesday.<\/p>\n The High Commission said ‘serious social unrest’ continued and condemned the widespread looting and burning of businesses and public property, including schools.<\/p>\n The cause of the riots: Reducing local representation<\/strong><\/p>\n The French parliament passed a bill on Tuesday that would allow all citizens who have lived on the island for more than 10 years to vote in local elections, arguing that New Caledonia’s pro-independence movements would weaken the representation of the region’s indigenous population, the Kanaks.<\/p>\n The change, which requires a constitutional amendment, must be approved by parliamentarians in the Senate and National Assembly in a joint vote.<\/p>\n Since 2007, only those who were eligible to vote in 1998 (when the French government signed an agreement recognising ‘the legitimacy of the Kanaks as the indigenous people of New Caledonia’ and granting the territory greater autonomy) or their descendants have been able to elect the local executive.<\/p>\n As tensions escalated in Noum\u00e9a, the capital of New Caledonia, airports were closed and a curfew was imposed last night to prevent riots. Louis Le Franc, France’s representative in the region, described the low death toll as a ‘miracle’.<\/p>\n Local media reported looting, arson and the use of firearms.<\/p>\n Interior Minister G\u00e9rald Darmanin said in a radio interview that ‘around 100’ security forces had been injured and that the curfew would remain in place.<\/p>\n In a statement, the Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front, the region’s main pro-independence force and the largest party in the local congress, “condemned” Tuesday night’s violence and called for “calm and appeasement”. “The unstable social climate … clearly shows the desire of a section of the population to make their voice heard about their future and the future of their country,” the party said, reiterating its call for the electoral reform to be scrapped in parliament.<\/p>\n Sonia Back\u00e8s, a local official and former minister in Macron’s government who opposes the region’s independence, called for France to declare a “state of emergency” and accused some separatists of promoting “anti-white racism”.<\/p>\n Three referendums on New Caledonia’s independence will be held between 2018 and 2021. In the first two, a narrow majority of voters supported remaining part of France, but the third was held with a low turnout, with separatists calling on their supporters to boycott the vote after the state refused to postpone it due to the Covid-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n Social media ban<\/strong><\/p>\n Meanwhile, the French government has announced a ban on TikTok in a bid to tackle the insurgency in the region.<\/p>\n French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said the popular video-sharing app would be shut down as part of a state of emergency that includes the deployment of the army and a curfew on the island of around 270,000 people.<\/p>\n In July 2023, French President Emmanuel Macron floated the idea of shutting down platforms such as Snapchat and TikTok in a bid to contain riots in France’s major cities after a teenager was killed by a police officer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In New Caledonia, the French colonial territory, Paris’ new electoral law has provoked a reaction from the indigenous population. Accusing the French government of trying to weaken the representation of the region’s indigenous population, French law enforcement officials have launched an intensive crackdown on the locals. Three people lost their lives in the last night […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4380,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[842,2313,2377,1814,2378,1817],"class_list":["post-4379","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-europe","tag-france","tag-gabriel-attal","tag-new-caledonia","tag-social-media","tag-state-of-emergency","tag-tiktok"],"yoast_head":"\n