Avignon: the diocese does not wish to sell its premises to squatters
Squatted since four years, the premises currently occupied, 7 rue Pasteur in Avignon, by the Rosmerta collective to house migrants will not be sold. The situation is at an impasse – the collective offers to buy them for 500,000 euros, the diocese finds that it is a low price and refuses to sell – for its part the collective, in theory deportable since December 31, 2022 refuses to rent at the prices requested by the diocese.
It turns out that in November 2019 the court ordered the eviction of the squat, but in three years – the building had been empty since 2017, after being rented by the diocese to the UDAF. At the time, around fifty “unaccompanied minors” migrants and families were accommodated there – in theory, they should have been accommodated by the public authorities.
“Rosmerta is deadlocked in Avignon. The association hosting migrants in a building of the diocese of the intramuros for four years now. Archbishop François Fonlupt does not wish to sell them this building. Rosmerta for her part does not want to rent it at the rates offered by the diocese.
In June, Rosmerta offered to buy the building pay 500,000 euros. A price below the market, admit the volunteers, but negotiable and which takes into account the state of the building, the presence of asbestos and the necessary work. Rosmerta has received no official response, but Archbishop François Fonlupt has since clarified to France Bleu that he does not wish to sell.
He prefers to rent: a 20-year lease at 3,500 euros per month. Too much for Rosmerta who denounces the slowness of the negotiations. Four years indeed that this file skates“.