https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-05-15/riots-rock-france-new-caledonia-over-voti...France sends more police and seeks talks to quell New Caledonia riots
Dubravka Voloder, Stephen Dziedzic and Jenny Cai with wires
Posted 1h ago
In short:
France has sent extra police to try to quell riots in New Caledonia, after an eruption of violence this week in protest against plans to allow more people to take part in local elections.
Violence continued despite a night-time curfew on Tuesday that banned public gatherings.
What's next? The French National Assembly adopted the constitutional reform late on Tuesday, but it would still have to pass a second round to become law.
France has sent extra police squadrons to quell riots on the Pacific island of New Caledonia after the French Pacific archipelago was rocked by a night of rioting against a controversial voting reform that has angered pro-independence forces.
Shots were fired at security forces, vehicles torched and shops looted in the rioting — the worst such violence in New Caledonia since deadly unrest in the 1980s.
More than 130 people were arrested, according to the French high commission of the republic in New Caledonia.
The proposed reforms would allow French residents who have lived in New Caledonia for 10 years to vote in provincial elections — a move local leaders fear will dilute the vote of pro-independence Indigenous Kanaks.
According to French media, the French National Assembly adopted the constitutional reform late on Tuesday local time, but it would still have to pass a second round to become law.
Kanak journalist Andre Qaeze said the situation remained tense in the capital, Noumea.
"The French government, they are very specialised. They have the means, they have guns, they have the cars."
"This evening, there is a plane which will arrive from Paris with soldiers, they are arriving to help the police forces to try to stop all this violence."
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