at least 15 injured among the police
The evacuation of a migrant camp near the Calais hospital took place in peace this Thursday morning but around 10 a.m. but it was on the other side of the city, in the Turquerie Zone where exiles try to get in the trucks to reach England, that a clash has broken out.
60 CRS and gendarmes against 100 migrants
60 CRS and gendarmes who secured the area from having been attacked by a majority of migrants. According to a police source on the spot, the attack was “incredible violence“. A CRS says that the migrants “had bags full of rocks and ballast in their tents“. The fight lasted an hour, witnesses “a war scene“with migrants who threw stones and CRS who responded with tear gas and fire from defense bullets.
According to the Auberge des migrants, an association that helps exiles, the migrants were very angry because the police prevented them from collecting belongings in the tents. About thirty makeshift shelters were reportedly seized.
At least 15 CRS injured
At least 15 CRS were hospitalized according to a police source for bruises, injuries and a police officer is said to have a broken leg. Several migrants were also injured in the clash.
In a press release, the Pas-de-Calais prefecture “strongly condemns this violence and gives its full support to the injured police and gendarmes”. it also specifies that “a hundred migrants showing great aggressiveness” would have refused to leave the premises at the time of the evacuation operation launched by the police.
The prefecture of Pas-de-Calais also recalls that “these operations aim to put an end to the illegal occupations in Calais and their objectives are to avoid the reconstitution of a large unhealthy encampment and to remove migrants from the Mafia networks of smugglers” .