Protesters in riot-hit New Caledonia refused on Monday to abandon roadblocks that have stopped much of the Pacific archipelago and halted commercial air traffic, French media reported.
France sent 1,000 armed police, soldiers and national security reinforcements to its overseas territory, a popular vacation spot rocked by seven nights of violence that left six people dead and hundreds injured.
The unrest has been raging since May 13 in New Caledonia, with a population of about 270,000. Protesters are unhappy with Paris’ plans to introduce new rules that would give tens of thousands of non-indigenous residents the right to vote.
About 600 heavily armed French police and paramilitary troops have “neutralised” 76 roadblocks on the 60-kilometer (40-mile) route between the capital Nouméa and La Tontouta International Airport, officials said. The airport is still out of service for all commercial flights.
The French High Commission in New Caledonia said forces would remove burned-out vehicles cluttering a key route used to deliver essential food and supplies and roadblocks stopping major roads.
Protesters vow to continue rioting
Pro-independence activists, mostly indigenous Kanak residents, said they had no intention of loosening their stranglehold.
The Coordinating Cell for Ground Action, or CCAT, which organised the protests, said:
We are maintaining our road blocks in place.
The group said only emergency medical and firefighting vehicles will be able to use the roads during the nighttime curfew.
Indigenous Kanaks have suffered discrimination for too long, the group said, pushing for a peaceful settlement but criticising a plan by France’s “colonial state” to expand voting rights.
AFP journalists reported that some roadblocks that were destroyed by French security forces were being rebuilt by pro-independence forces, sometimes larger than before.
A pickup truck carrying about 10 masked and hooded men armed with machetes drove by in a suburb of Nouméa, AFP reporters said. Local post office director Thomas de Deckker, referring to the post-apocalyptic zombie television series, said:
It feels like being in the The Walking Dead. We have no visibility of when we will have security again.
Laloua Savea, one resident, also said:
The islands are on fire, for sure, but we have to remember that they tried to be heard for a long time and it led to nothing. It had to degenerate for the state to see us, for the politicians to see us. They must be heard, even if they are going about it the wrong way.
Police have already detained 230 people. About 3,200 people people have either stranded in New Caledonia or cannot return to the archipelago, which lies more than 1,000 kilometres (800 miles) east of Australia.
Authorities promise to rebuild New Caledonia
President Emmanuel Macron has called a meeting of the Defence and Security Council for Monday. Prime Minister Gabriel Attal met with parliamentary party leaders on Friday to discuss the possibility of extending the state of emergency beyond 12 days. That would require the approval of the lower house of the National Assembly and the upper house of the Senate.
Meanwhile, the head of the island’s economy, Christopher Gyges, said New Caledonia would fully recover. He told a news conference:
There will be no food shortage, no petrol shortage. I think it’s extremely important to reassure New Caledonians.
A nighttime curfew, a state of emergency, a ban on TikTok and reinforcements failed to stop the riots and hit roadblocks.
New Caledonia has been a French territory since the mid-1800s.
Nearly two centuries later, its politics are still dominated by debates over whether the islands should be part of France, autonomous or independent, with opinions divided roughly along ethnic lines. Indigenous Kanaks make up about 40 per cent of the population, but they tend to be poorer and have fewer years of schooling than European Caledonians.
Kanak groups believe the latest voting rules will dilute the indigenous vote.
Civil liberties groups have challenged the TikTok ban, and an emergency hearing will take place on Tuesday at France’s highest administrative court in Paris.
Nicolas Dupont-Aignan, leader of the party Debout la France (France Arise), criticised the French authorities’ handling of the unrest on X:
New Caledonia and Mayotte have been blazing for months.
Organised crime kills two prison officers in #Incarville with impunity. Incidents involving foreign nationals under #OQTF are on the rise in the metropolis. Yet Darmanin and Dupond-Moretti remain ministers and Emmanuel Macron remains president.Macron has stated that his fight against drugs is a “clean slate”. Yes, the French people urgently need a “clean slate”… from a government that is incapable of dealing with the country’s woes!
