“Marseille does not need compassion. She needs a state that protects” | EUROtoday

LThe assassination of Mehdi Kessaci, Thursday November 13, froze Marseille. In broad daylight, in the course of Marseille, a younger man was shot useless as a result of his brother, Amine, refused to offer in to drug trafficking. It wasn’t a stray bullet. It was an execution. A message addressed to a household that’s preventing and, past that, to all those that dare to defend theirs. A message addressed to the State itself.

The shock is immense. And it’s all the extra so as a result of it happens in a metropolis crossed by an injustice that nobody ought to ignore anymore. Only six kilometers separate Roucas-Blanc, one of many wealthiest neighborhoods in France, from Belle-de-Mai, one of many poorest in Europe. Two worlds that do not converse to one another. Two worlds that not have something in widespread, besides this violence that also thrives on the identical facet of the divide.

For thirty years, Marseille has been experiencing this open-air shift. And the figures verify it. The Ministry of the Interior recalled in February: 110 individuals had been killed in 2024 due to drug trafficking, in comparison with 139 in 2023, and 341 had been injured [en France]. Over the identical 12 months, 367 assassinations or makes an attempt had been recorded. At the identical time, cocaine seizures reached a historic document: 53.5 tonnes, or +130% in a single 12 months. This is the truth. A parallel economic system that has turn into an influence that challenges the State, households and even the establishments that ought to shield.

Repression alone can do nothing

And we should inform the reality: this economic system is prospering as a result of consumption is exploding. The French Observatory of Drugs and Addictive Tendencies (OFDT) has been measuring this for years: 21 million individuals have already experimented with hashish, 1.4 million use it frequently, and cocaine impacts 1.1 million customers per 12 months. Health Insurance itself warned, in a report revealed in July 2024, of a rise of greater than 60% in using psychotropic medication amongst 12-25 12 months olds between 2019 and 2023. When demand is that this sturdy, the market follows. It’s mechanical. And that is what the general public authorities refuse to face.

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