curfew decreed in Nouméa for subsequent evening because of riots on the sidelines of the vote on constitutional reform within the Assembly | EUROtoday

Vehicles burned, shops looted, clashes between demonstrators and the police: violence punctuated the evening from Monday May 13 to Tuesday May 14 in Nouméa, 17,000 kilometers from Paris, the place deputies are trying right into a constitutional revision denounced by the separatists of New Caledonia.

Consequently, the High Commission of the Republic in New Caledonia introduced a curfew for the evening from Tuesday to Wednesday within the city space of ​​Nouméa. The curfew is decreed from Tuesday 6 p.m. to Wednesday 6 a.m., introduced, in a press launch launched shortly after 8 a.m. native Tuesday (11 p.m. Monday in Paris) the consultant of the State on this South Pacific territory. “It can be renewed as much as necessary”specifies the textual content.

In addition, any gathering is prohibited in higher Nouméa, as is the carrying of weapons and the sale of alcohol all through New Caledonia, reviews the excessive fee which invitations the 270,000 inhabitants of the Oceanian archipelago to remain at house.

At the doorway to the New Caledonian “capital”, a big manufacturing facility, specializing in bottling, was the sufferer of an arson assault and fully ravaged by flames on Monday round 10 p.m. native time (1 p.m. native time). of Paris), famous a journalist from Agence France-Presse (AFP). Several supermarkets had been looted in Nouméa, but in addition within the neighboring cities Dumbéa and Le Mont-Dore. At least two automotive dealerships had been additionally engulfed in flames round 11 p.m., Agence France-Presse (AFP) was additionally capable of observe.

Solemn vote of deputies Tuesday afternoon

As evening fell, cellular gendarmes and law enforcement officials had been battling younger masked or hooded demonstrators, who took over a number of roundabouts. Fires had been lit on the highway to impede site visitors, whereas pictures from defensive bullet launchers and de-encirclement grenades had been heard all through the city.

The first altercations with the police started in the course of the day, on the sidelines of the independence mobilization towards the constitutional reform examined Monday within the National Assembly, which goals to increase the citizens in provincial elections, essential in New Caledonia . Established in 1998 by the Nouméa settlement, the electoral physique is in actual fact frozen, which has the consequence, twenty-five years later, of depriving practically one in 5 voters of the precise to vote. For the Minister of the Interior and Overseas Territories, Gérald Darmanin, who carried out this constitutional reform, this provision “no longer conforms to the principles of democracy”.

But the separatists criticize, conversely, a thaw which dangers “minorize the Kanak indigenous people even further”. The authorities mission shall be submitted to a solemn vote by deputies on Tuesday afternoon. “I have a thought for the police (…)and particularly for the gendarmes, from whom we are currently evacuating families threatened with death by demonstrators who do not go through democracy, but through violence, live ammunition, intimidation and death threats.castigated Gérald Darmanin from the podium of the Assembly on Monday.

Fear of recent incidents

In its press launch, the excessive fee, which denounces “disturbing public order of great intensity”, reviews 36 arrests. “ Those arrested will be presented to justice during the day”it’s specified.

The gendarmerie, which is liable for most of New Caledonia, indicated, at first of the night, 26 gendarmes injured, together with one critically, in a single eye, by the clashes of the day. “No serious injuries have been reported among the population. “, says the press release from the high commission.

In fear of new incidents, the RAID, four squadrons of mobile gendarmes and two sections of CRS 8, a unit specializing in the fight against urban violence, will arrive as reinforcements, AFP learned from a source close to the matter.

Near Nouméa, the road which crosses the tribe of Saint-Louis, an independent stronghold, at Mont-Dore and which connects the south of the island to Nouméa was cut by the police, due to the presence of numerous demonstrators, armed with stones, and lit fires on the road.

The popular district of Montravel, in Nouméa, also had to be cut off to traffic on several occasions, as well as the expressway which connects the city to the north of the island.

In a statement previously published Monday, the High Commissioner of the Republic in New Caledonia, Louis Le Franc, condemned “the blockades of public roads which have taken place since this morning and the numerous attacks on police officers and soldiers of the national gendarmerie”. He specified that he had given the order to “gradual unlocking” busy roads in the course of the day.