“Leave or burn”: In Calais, an upsurge in anti-migrant acts on the sidelines of the elections

Monday June 17, it is after 5 p.m., a group of around ten exiles are sitting quietly on the sidewalk opposite the premises of Secours Catholique, Quai de Moscow, in Calais (62). It’s the end of the day reception, the group is preparing to leave for their camp, a precarious, unsanitary shelter on the outskirts of the city. A car then arrives at full speed, slows down near the association and sprays the exiles with water. The vehicle passes a second time, says Rasta, a solidarity activist who has been involved for several years: “They threw stones at the guys, shouting insults like ‘wogs’ and ‘niggers’.”says the man with the dreadlocks. Alerted, community workers and other refugees leave the day center to understand what is happening. “The people in the car were planning to come back a third time,” says Rasta, “but when they saw us, they decided not to slow down.” The vehicle drives past the premises again, at high speed with the windows open, the passengers continuing to shout xenophobic insults, then disappears down the street. In a cold rage, Rasta lets out:

“It was pure racism. »

Numerous intimidations and violence

“This type of act is new lately,” notes Rasta, “convinced that this is not an isolated act.” The activist is not wrong, Intimidation and violence targeting exiled people have increased in recent weeks in Calais and the surrounding region, as the European election approaches and even more so since the announcement of the dissolution of the National Assembly. On June 8, Ali (1), a Sudanese man in his twenties, with curly hair and headphones around his neck, said he was targeted while he was walking on the seafront, near the avenue Raymond Poincaré, in Calais. “A car, with two men and a woman inside, came up to me,” explains the young exile. He pursues :

“They rolled down the windows and aimed at me with balloons filled with I don’t know what substance. »

Ali managed to dodge the projectiles and then tried, without success, to pursue the vehicle which accelerated and moved away very quickly.

“I’m not the only one, other exiles have been victims of this kind of attack,” sighs Ali, disillusioned. This is the case for Fayçal (1), a 20-year-old Egyptian, who says he suffered the same type of attack on Tuesday, June 25, while he was playing football with other people on the seafront. “There were four of them, in a black Volkswagen, they passed by several times,” adds the young exile. Fayçal is not even surprised, he explains that a month earlier, Several young men came to throw firecrackers at the tents of the “Jungle” where he surviveslocated near rue de Judea, before also scampering off in a black vehicle.

Another recent example of an act deliberately targeting exiles: Friday June 14, in Loon-Plage, near Dunkirk, the contents of a cistern, one of the rare points of access to water for people living in the camps, was polluted by a blue chemical liquid. “A priori, no one was poisoned,” indicates Célestin Pichaud, coordinator of Utopia 56 in Grande-Synthe, who specifies that “a complaint was filed and a sample from the tank was sent to the gendarmerie.” The association has no news of the investigation and fears that other similar malicious acts may occur in the future.

“Leave or burn”

Residents of the squat located on Rue Frédéric Sauvage in Calais were also targeted in the days following the announcement of the dissolution. On the night of 11 to 12 June 2024, the following slogans were spray-painted on a wall of the compound behind the squat: “Down with migration tyranny! For my land”, “End of leftist hypocrisy! For non-conformist France” and “Leave or burn”. A tap, installed near the tagged walls and allowing exiles from the squat and surrounding areas to have access to water, was also put out of service“The most shocking thing is the threat ‘Leave or burn’ which is addressed directly to people who come to get water,” laments Camille (1), one of the local residents.

New inscriptions appeared during the night of June 12 to 13. The slogan “France to the French”, and the name of the president of the National Rally (RN), Jordan Bardella, accompanied by a heart were written in marker on the entrance gate of the squat. “Putty was also put on the padlock of our front door during the night,” explains Camille. This series of tags occurs when, on June 11, a group of residents, hostile to the existence of the squat, illegally entered the place and committed damage. “Windows were broken, the water point in the garage was damaged and dishwashing liquid was sprayed on the floor,” explains Camille.

Since its opening in February 2022 by the Calais Logement pour Toustes collective, the squat located on Rue Frédéric Sauvage has been contested by local residents. The place is also in the sights of the mayor of Calais, Natacha Bouchart (LR), but also of Marc de Fleurian, president of the Rassemblement National (RN) group on the municipal council. and who won 49.33% in the early legislative elections. The far-right elected official has visited the squat several times and has made numerous public appeals on the subject, posing as a defender of local residents. As part of the campaign, Marc de Fleurian is also defending the reinstatement of the offence of illegal residence and is demanding “zero tolerance towards far-left No Border activists who are accomplices of the smugglers” accused of “making the daily lives of the inhabitants of the territory rotten”. Measures that would automatically worsen the daily lives of exiles stuck at the border, already marked by police harassment, regular expulsions from camps and appalling living conditions. “For the inhabitants of the squat, in the short term, it is clear that it would be important if the RN did not win these legislative elections, but what worries us more is the extreme right-wing shift in ideas, and that is not new”, notes Camille.

“The release of racist discourse results in an increase in violence against exiles”, analyzes Axel Gaudinat, coordinator of Utopia 56 in Calais, listing the threats and anti-migrant acts that he has observed in recent weeks at the border. “It’s worrying, fascism seeks to hinder, or even destroy, any expression of solidarity,” notes the association, which adds:

“We fear that worse things will happen in the coming weeks, both for the exiled people and for their supporters.”