First group of French tourists stranded due to riots evacuated from New Caledonia
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Riots left a trail of destruction, including such damage in Noumea, New Caledonia, on May 20.
PHOTO: AFP
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NOUMEA – The first evacuation flights for French tourists stranded in New Caledonia due to riots in the Pacific territory
The international airport in the capital Noumea has remained closed for more than a week and all commercial flights have been cancelled due to the unrest.
“Measures to send foreigners and French tourists home continue,” the high commission said in a statement.
The tourists departed on May 25 from the Magenta airfield in Noumea aboard military aircraft headed for Australia and New Zealand, according to an AFP journalist.
They will then have to take commercial flights to mainland France.
“I came on vacation to visit my best friend... The conflict broke out and I got stuck (in Noumea),” Ms Audrey, who did not give her last name, told AFP.
Australia and New Zealand had begun repatriating their nationals on May 21.
The situation has been gradually easing for the many people trapped in the territory which has been shaken since May 13 by riots over planned voting reforms.
Seven people have been killed in the violence. The latest incident was of a man who was shot dead on May 24 by a policeman who was attacked by protesters.
French President Emmanuel Macron flew to the archipelago on May 23 in an urgent bid to defuse the political crisis.
He pledged during his trip that the planned voting reforms “will not be forced through”.
Indigenous Kanaks had earlier objected, saying that the planned reforms would dilute their influence by extending voting rights to newcomers to the Pacific archipelago, located about 17,000km from mainland France.
“Violence should never be allowed to take root,” Mr Macron said during a televised interview with local journalists at the end of his visit on May 24.
“What I want is a message of order and return to calm as this is not the Wild West,” he said. “A path must be opened for the calming of tensions and this will allow us to build what happens next.”
The pro-independence Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) party on May 25 reiterated its demand for the withdrawal of the voting reforms after meeting Mr Macron.
“The FLNKS asked the President of the French Republic that a strong announcement be made from him indicating the withdrawal of the draft constitutional law,” it said in a statement, adding that this was a “prerequisite to ending the crisis”.
In Paris, French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said “the situation in New Caledonia today remains extremely fragile”.
France has enforced a state of emergency, flying in hundreds of police and military reinforcements to restore order.
New Caledonia has been ruled from Paris since the 1800s, but many indigenous Kanaks still resent France’s power over their islands and want fuller autonomy or independence. AFP
