MAMOUDZOU, France: The French government hoped Wednesday to have brokered an end to a month of protests on its Indian Ocean island territory of Mayotte, where locals have been blocking streets to protest living standards and security problems.
Mayotte, an island of 250,000 people that is part of the Comoros archipelago of islands off southeast Africa, has been in turmoil since mid-February.
Violent clashes between rival gangs at a school sparked anger over spiralling crime which many residents blame on migrants from non-French Comoran islands.
Five hours of negotiations late on Tuesday between protest leaders and France’s minister for overseas territories, Annick Girardin, appeared to have provided a breakthrough.
“A plan to tackle security problems has been confirmed,” said Fatihou Ibrahime, a spokesman for the protest movement, adding that there had been “real progress.”
At a major rally in the main town of Mamoudzou on Wednesday, the protest leaders are set to propose lifting road blocks that have paralyzed the island.
The island, which voted to become an integral part of France in 2009, has been plagued by strikes, demonstrations and road blocks aimed at drawing the attention of the government in Paris to the situation.
Per capita economic output on the island is a quarter of that on the French mainland and the unemployment rate of 25.9 percent is over double that in France as a whole.
Ahead of her visit, Girardin promised to tackle the phenomenon of pregnant women arriving by boat from nearby islands to give birth on French soil, as a way of obtaining French and EU citizenship for their child.
Around 70 percent of the 10,000 babies born every year in the maternity hospital in Mamoudzou are born to illegal migrants, mainly from the nearby Comoran islands of Anjouan, Moheli and Grande Comore, according to official statistics.
Girardin has suggested giving the hospital special “extra-territorial” status so that children born there do not automatically qualify for citizenship by birth.
The Comoros, one of the world’s poorest countries, was a French colony until 1975 when it declared independence. But Mayotte opted to remain part of France.
The French island is not the only overseas territory that has become a magnet for migrants while itself trying to play catch-up with mainland France on health, housing and education.
French Guiana, situated between Brazil and Suriname in South America, has experienced a surge of arrivals from Haiti and neighboring countries in recent years that has also put pressure on under-resourced hospitals and schools.
That led to months-long protests ahead of France’s presidential election last year, which prompted promises of extra security forces and funding.
Breakthrough to end protests on French island Mayotte
Breakthrough to end protests on French island Mayotte
Ukraine marks four years since Russian invasion
- Tuesday’s anniversary is expected to see the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, and the president of the European Council, Antonio Costa, in Kyiv to mark the occasion
KYIV, Ukraine: Ukraine was on Tuesday marking the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion, with a show of solidarity from its staunchest allies and no immediate end in sight to Europe’s bloodiest conflict since World War II.
Tens of thousands of lives have been lost since the Kremlin ordered troops into Ukraine on February 24, 2022, confident of a quick victory but not expecting the fierce resistance that followed.
The worldwide fallout of the war has been immense, with many European countries increasing their own defense spending in anticipation of a possible confrontation of their own with Russia.
But diplomatic talks between the two sides, relaunched last year by the United States, have so far failed to halt the fighting, which has devastated Ukraine and left it facing the mammoth task — and bill — of reconstruction.
Tuesday’s anniversary is expected to see the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, and the president of the European Council, Antonio Costa, in Kyiv to mark the occasion.
Both said they would take part in a “commemoration ceremony” and visit the site of a Ukrainian energy facility damaged by Russian strikes before attending a meeting with President Volodymyr Zelensky.
They are also due to take part in a videoconference meeting with Kyiv’s allies — the so-called “Coalition of the Willing” which includes Britain, France and Germany.
- Impasse -
Russia, which currently occupies nearly 20 percent of Ukrainian territory, bombs civilian areas and infrastructure on a daily basis.
The Russian bombardment has sparked the worst energy crisis since the start of the invasion, during a bitter winter.
Kyiv’s Western allies have slapped heavy sanctions on Moscow, forcing it to redirect its key oil exports toward new markets, particularly in Asia.
Despite heavy losses, Russian troops have in recent months advanced slowly on the frontline, particularly in the eastern Donbas region, which has been the epicenter of the bloody fighting and which Moscow wants to annex.
US-brokered talks are ongoing, with Zelensky unwavering in his demands for security guarantees from Washington before any talk of “compromise,” including on territory, with Russia.
Russia, though, has rejected Ukrainian proposals for the deployment of European troops in Ukraine after any ceasefire deal.
President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly warned that he will pursue his objectives by force if diplomacy fails.
- Reconstruction -
The grinding four-year war has devastated Ukraine, which even before the fighting was one of the poorest countries in Europe.
According to a joint World Bank, European Union and United Nations report with Kyiv, published on Monday, the cost of post-war reconstruction is estimated at around $558 billion over the next decade.
Russia justified sending troops into Ukraine to prevent Ukraine’s ambition to join NATO, arguing that Kyiv’s membership of the transatlantic alliance would threaten its own security.
On Monday, during a medal ceremony to mark “Defenders of the Fatherland Day,” Putin insisted that his soldiers were defending Russia’s “borders” in Ukraine, to ensure “strategic parity” between powers and fight for the country’s “future.”
Ukraine, a former Soviet republic, for its part considers the war to be a resurgence of Russian imperialism aimed at subjugating the Ukrainian people.
In an interview with the BBC broadcast on Sunday, Zelensky said he believed Putin had “already started” World War III.
“Russia wants to impose on the world a different way of life and change the lives people have chosen for themselves,” he told the British public broadcaster.
