Fez – France’s ministry of interior has deployed units of French special forces to restore order on the Caribbean island of Guadeloupe after riots, looting, and shooting at law enforcement intensified during protests against COVID-19 measures.
Gerald Darmanin, France’s Interior Minister, vowed on November 20 to dispatch about 50 members of the elite GIGN and RAID tactical units of the gendarmerie and police to the French overseas territory.
These additional staff will bring the number of police and gendarmes available in Guadeloupe to 2,250, Darmanin said.
After an emergency meeting in Paris, the minister said that dozens were arrested after rioters fired at police officers in Guadeloupe and looted stores.
Reports from the Caribbean island say that protesters have broken into a depot of arms and ammunition, with authorities worried things will get worse.
Some protesters have set fire to cars and buildings, in addition to blockading roads, according to videos posted on social media.
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French media outlets reported that several buildings in downtown Pointe-a-Pitre, the island’s largest city, have been destroyed.
The island has been placed under a dusk-to-dawn curfew until Tuesday morning. On Monday, police said that 38 individuals had been arrested for looting and destroying stores and that they had begun tearing down protester-erected barriers.
Protesters are angry with the decision that health workers must be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 across all the French territories.
French government spokesperson, Gabriel Attal, vowed to firmly respond to the “small minority” that spearheaded the waves of violence and vandalism. Authorities in Paris are worried, and there are suggestions the government might reconsider its COVID measures for Guadeloupe to prevent further turmoil in the French overseas department.
For Maite Hubert M’Toumo, the secretary-general of the General Union of Guadeloupe’s Workers (UGTG), the sudden eruption of violence and public indignation goes beyond popular dissatisfaction with France’s COVID measures.
He said the ongoing protests “express the depth of suffering, inequality, poverty, and exclusion felt by the people, especially the young and the elderly.”
