France has sent a team of special riot police to the the Indian Ocean territory of Mayotte to stem a wave of violence between rival gangs. One person has been killed and several injured during 10 days of clashes.
"For 15 years, Mayotte, the island of perfumes, has become the island of hell," mayor of the cpital Mamoudzou, Ambdilwahédou Soumaila, told AFP on Tuesday.
Faced with an unprecedented escalation of gang violence, France's Interior Ministry dispatched a dozen police officers from Raid, the elite police intervention unit, who were due to arrive on Tuesday to support local security forces.
The move comes after the death of a 20-year-old man in the Kawéni district who was killed with a machete on 12 November.
Kawéni has the largest concentration of businesses and schools as well as the largest slum in the department.
On Saturday, 200 to 250 young people from the Kawéni district gathered to fight rivals from the Doujani district, further south, according to police.
On Sunday, a motorist was stabbed in Mtsapéré Bonovo, another district of Mamoudzou.
In 10 days of inter-district conflicts, school buses and buildings were set on fire and several people were wounded.
'Zone of lawlessness'
MP for Mayotte Estelle Youssouffa accused authorities in Paris of ignoring the island's calls for help. She referred to "barbarism and terror" as a result of a "cycle of vengeance" among youth.
"We are talking about hordes of hundreds of young people, most of them Comorians in an irregular situation, who are between 12 and 13 years old, armed with machetes, looking to kill," she said.
"If the state does nothing, citizens will take care of it," she had already warned back in October, referring to groups of neighbourhood vigilantes that had sprung up due to the fear over insecurity.
"We are in a zone of lawlessness and we are really going to fall into anarchy."
In mid-October, mayors and elected officials from Mayotte had alerted Paris to the increase of "unbearable" and growing violence in the department.
The mayor of Mamoudzou, who like the rest of the Mahoran political class approved the sending of elite units to the island, has requested that they stay "until the Republic regains its rights".
According to him, it is no longer a question of just "keeping order", "we have to fight them, go find them where they are in the slums, the remote neighborhoods, catch them and bring them to justice", he said.
Reinforcements
In the meantime, the police kept away several groups who wanted to clash on Monday evening, according to a police source.
Small groups took the opportunity to attack road users, according to witnesses.
South of Mamoudzou, police officers from the anti-crime brigade (BAC) intervened around 8pm local time to clear a roadblock in Tsoundzou, while a group of young people clashed with the police in Cavani.
Around 5am local time, a group of individuals set up a fire barrier near the court, in the same area.
The school transport service, which had been suspended since last Wednesday over security concerns resumed Tuesday morning but without serving the districts of Kawéni and Majicavo.
Investigations have begun into the events that took place last week the public prosecutor, Yann Le Bris, said Monday, specifying that "at this stage, only a few minors have been arrested".
On a visit in August, the Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin promised measures such as correctional centres and gendarmerie reinforcements, which should be available next summer.
Mayotte is the poorest corner of the European Union, with the Covid crisis exacerbating poverty.
