PARIS (AP) — French President Emmanuel Macron is making a surprise trip to riot-hit New Caledonia, the French Pacific territory that has been gripped by days of deadly unrest and where indigenous people have long sought independence.
“He will go there tonight,” government spokesperson Prisca Thevenot said after a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday where the president said he’d decided to make the more than 33,000-kilometer (20,000-mile) round trip himself to the archipelago east of Australia.
Six people have been killed, including two gendarmes, and hundreds of others injured in New Caledonia amid armed clashes, looting and arson, raising new questions about Macron’s handling of France’s colonial legacy.
There have been decades of tensions between indigenous Kanaks who seek independence for the archipelago of 270,000 people, and descendants of colonizers and colonists who want to remain part of France.
Carriers sanguine on travel season
Travis Kelce downs whiskey shot on slice of bread at Kelce Jam without Taylor Swift
Ceremony of resumption of diplomatic relations between China and Nauru about to begin
Over 70 national IP protection centers under construction or in operation in China
Visually impaired girl plays Beijing 2022 theme song Snowflake
China's first intelligent offshore drilling platform installed
Village in China's Henan transformed by cultural industries