In Toulouse, a “sector” of delinquents from Mostaganem, Algeria
Migrants from the Algerian coastal city massively engage in drug trafficking to survive, and increase crime in the pink city.
Toulouse and Mostaganem: two cities linked… by their criminals? A few years, the city of the South-West indeed undergoes the arrival of many illegal immigrants from the coastal city of Algeria, the latter, as told The Midi Dispatch exploding crime figures.
Read alsoEmmanuel Macron “regrets” the “misunderstandings” with Algeria, indicates the Elysée
It all starts with aancient diaspora from Mostaganem and settled in Toulouse», describes Olivier Peyroux, sociologist and member of the association Trajectoires, with the Figaro. “The first arrivals came with labor immigration, in the 1970s. Arrivals were reactivated by the migration crisis” of the last few years, indicates the manager, who informs the educators in the field for the care of these migrants.
A new support network would thus have been set up, which would guide thousands of Algerians from this town of around 150,000 inhabitants towards the pink city. Boat to Alicante, in Spain, transit through Barcelona then entry into France by various passes, in particular the village of Fos, in Haute-Garonne, quote The Dispatch. Over the past few years, the oldest arrivals would guide the new ones to them, in what looks like a chain, even if no such system has been identified by the police.
Only, unlike worker immigration, no work now awaits young migrants in Toulouse, who also experience unemployment of around 30% in their hometown. A disappointment for those who thought they were arriving in a “Eldorado“, as described by a police officer interviewed by The Dispatchbecause many of their compatriots lie about their life in Toulouse, with posts on social networks.
800 lawsuits in 2021
Nevertheless, a community phenomenon seems to be at work, particularly in the Saint-Michel district. Older migrants exploit younger ones, trusting them with small smuggling missions. “In the 1980s, to earn enough to eat or wear, these undocumented migrants turned to selling cigarettes on the street. Cartridges purchased in Spain or Andorra at bargain prices. But for five years, they have also been eyeing drug trafficking or snatching, especially in the metro“, thus testifies a policeman questioned by The Dispatch. Another, near the Figaroshares the observation and confirmsa very accumulated delinquency of these young people, aged between 18 and 30 but many of whom pretend to be unaccompanied minors“. “They arrive in networks, and settle in delinquency especially since repatriations are a little at a standstill, with the Covid“, adds this policeman.
Read alsoJean-Pax Méfret, Pied-noir memory alive
Hence, a massive increase in reported delinquency. In 2016, 400 natives of Mostaganem have already been the subject of legal proceedings in the pink city and its surroundings. In 2021, the figure would have already doubled, to 800 prosecutions, corresponding to more than a thousand arrests for theft, assault and drug trafficking. “Crime in Toulouse comes a lot from this city, but there are from everywhere in Algeria“Nevertheless, specifies our police source.