France launches investigation into violence in New Caledonia that left seven people dead | The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

NICE, France – French prosecutors in New Caledonia said authorities have opened an investigation into the unrest that left seven people dead and caused widespread destruction in the Pacific archipelago, which has been plagued by decades of tension between those seeking independence and those loyal to France.

Violence flared on May 13 in response to attempts to change the French constitution and alter electoral rolls in New Caledonia. France declared a state of emergency in its Pacific territory on May 15 and sent hundreds of reinforcements to help police quell the uprising, which was marked by shootings, clashes, looting and arson.

“We are interested in those who pulled the strings, who directed the planning and who committed these attacks in New Caledonia,” prosecutor Yves Dupas said in an interview with France Info television late Tuesday. He added that investigators were interested in everyone on the island, “regardless of their degree of involvement or responsibility” in the unrest, whether they were “perpetrators or their sponsors.”

He said officials were investigating allegations of criminal association, criminal conduct and misdemeanors.

Authorities are also investigating people suspected of violence against civilians during the unrest, Dupas said. He said several New Caledonian police officers were in custody.

Among the seven people killed in the shootings were four members of the indigenous Kanak community and two gendarmes, Dupas said. One of the gendarmes was killed when a gun accidentally discharged, the French Interior Ministry said.

The prosecutor said he did not know whether any of those killed in the unrest were related to former French footballer Christian Karembeu, who said on Monday he was “in mourning” because two members of his family were shot dead in the recent violence.

Karembeu, who is Kanak and moved to mainland France as a teenager, was asked in an interview with French television channel Europe 1 whether his relatives had been the target of recent violence. The 1998 World Cup winner with France said: “It is true that it is a murder and we hope that these murders will be investigated and investigated.”

Since May 12, 442 people have been arrested in New Caledonia, Dupas said. Of these, 90 have been brought to justice, he said.

French President Emmanuel Macron decided on Monday to lift the state of emergency in New Caledonia in order to facilitate dialogue between local parties and the French authorities on the future of the archipelago of 270,000 inhabitants and to restore peace.

Pro-independence activists and Kanak leaders have called on Macron to withdraw the electoral reform bill if France wants to “end” the crisis. Opponents fear the electoral law will benefit pro-French politicians in New Caledonia and further marginalize indigenous Kanaks, who have long campaigned for freedom from French rule, amid huge economic inequalities.

New Caledonia became French in 1853 under Emperor Napoleon III, Napoleon’s nephew and heir. After World War II, it became an overseas territory and in 1957 all Kanaks were granted French citizenship.

People of European, mostly French, descent in New Caledonia, which long served as a penal colony of France and now houses a French military base, distinguish between the descendants of the colonialists and the descendants of the many prisoners who were forcibly deported to the area.

FILE – Christian Karembeu of France, left, protects the ball during the international soccer match between Germany and France in Stuttgart, Germany, Saturday, June 1, 1996. Former international soccer player Christian Karembeu, who won the 1998 World Cup and the 2000 European Championship with France, said two of his relatives were killed during unrest in the French Pacific territory of New Caledonia that left seven people dead. (AP Photo/Thomas Kienzle, File)