To end 2022 and start 2023, Gérald Darmanin is in Mayotte. On a two-day visit, the Minister of the Interior for Overseas France expressed in Dzaoudzi on Saturday his desire to strengthen the means of combating illegal immigration on the French island in the Indian Ocean, especially from the Comoros. neighbours.
During his last visit to Mayotte, in August, the technical and human resources had already been increased to try to thwart the arrival of migrants in this archipelago. Half of the population is foreign in the territory which includes two main islands and around thirty islets.
A sea trip to test a drone
The Minister now displays the ambition of “an extremely strong paradigm shift in Mayotte”, saying he wants to tackle the migratory flows upstream of the arrival of the boats on the shores of Mayotte.
After a trip at sea, to test the effectiveness of a drone capable of spotting boats five kilometers away, Gérald Darmanin announced “the creation of a GIR” (Interministerial Research Group) intended to investigate clandestine networks: “a specific group of police and gendarmes and other administrations working on illegal work and irregular immigration”.
“On December 27, a decree was published which provides that the judicial police investigation office that I announced three months ago to fight against irregular immigration and in particular smugglers, these merchants of misery […] is going to be created here in Mayotte,” he said. “There will therefore be specialized judicial police investigators, directly under the authority of the magistrates, which will save a lot of time rather than bringing in experts from mainland France or sending the files to mainland France”.
Upcoming announcements from Emmanuel Macron
The Minister also insisted on the involvement of the Élysée and the rest of the government in this file: it will thus be up to President Emmanuel Macron to decide “in the coming weeks” on this subject, and in particular on the implementation of legislation derogating from the right of the soil on the territory.
The arrivals of migrants in Mayotte are not weakening, from the Comoros archipelago but also from Africa’s Great Lakes, illustrated by the landing of around sixty people on Wednesday. Gérald Darmanin promised on this subject a tour of the African States concerned to facilitate the return of their nationals who have been refused asylum. He also formalized the maintenance for several months in the archipelago of the group of twelve RAID police officers, who arrived in November when the territory was experiencing a new outbreak of violence between rival gangs.