While the reckoning in France increases in a context of drug trafficking, the Ministers of the Interior and Justice, Bruno Retailleau and Didier Migaud, were in Marseille on Friday, November 8, to announce measures aimed at strengthening the fight against drug trafficking. drugs, against what the executive asks “general mobilization”. During a joint press conference, the two ministers revealed the general lines of their plan against organized crime.
First of all, the Minister of Justice announced the creation, “in the coming weeks”of a “national coordination cell” to fight this “whip”. “There is no inevitability, politics is a weapon to fight this crime”he assured, saying that he wanted “provide the means to prevent, prosecute, judge and punish”. This cell will be responsible, among other things, for “elaborate a state of threat, [de] establish an operational strategy and implement it »explained Didier Migaud, specifying that “the teams of the Paris prosecutor’s office working in the fight against organized crime at the national level [seraient] thus reinforced by 40%”.
The Minister of Justice said this “favorable” to the creation of a “true national prosecutor’s office”. He also said he was considering the sentence of “organized gang crimes”, linked in particular to narcotics, by special criminal courts, composed exclusively of professional magistrates, such as terrorism cases. Use only professional magistrates instead of popular juries, which normally constitute criminal courts. “would eliminate the risk of pressure being placed on jurors to guide the final judicial decision”declared the Minister of Justice. Didier Migaud also mentioned the status of repentants, whose protection he wants to improve.
The Minister of the Interior, Bruno Retailleau, has several times established the parallel between organized crime and terrorism, considering that “The existential threat [était] the same “or even that it was more important with respect to organized crime because it caused more victims, and that is why he wants to establish it as “national cause”. Evoking some ideas, such as the possibility of creating a “prohibition of appearing in and around the point of treatment” for a trafficker identified by the courts, the Minister of the Interior promised that “the octopus” drug trafficking was “perish”. “It will take fifteen, twenty years, it will be difficult, he admitted. But when there is political will, we achieve it. »
The traffic volume is estimated between 3,500 and 6,000 million euros
“The threat has increased and requires the State to arm itself more”the Minister of Justice had launched in an interview with Provence earlier Friday. “Cocaine seizures have quintupled in ten years, the hardest drugs are available in all territories and all the time. The rejuvenation of people who kill and are killed is appalling. “Drug trafficking is the fundamental cause of violence and corruption.”added Mr. Retailleau.
MM. Retailleau and Migaud were received by the mayor of Marseille, Benoît Payan, and then headed to the prefecture of Bouches-du-Rhône, where they met with associations and relatives of victims of murders linked to drug trafficking. The Minister of the Interior will then meet with the police forces of the northern districts, while Didier Migaud will travel to the Baumettes prison and the judicial court of Marseille, where he will meet with the heads of the courts and the jurisdiction, as well as as with the personnel of the specialized interregional jurisdiction (JIRS).
After several deadly shootings related to drug trafficking, Bruno Retailleau had promised a ” war ” a long and ruthless campaign against this trafficking, whose turnover is estimated between 3,500 and 6,000 million euros per year in France. The measures were already reviewed on Thursday during a meeting between the two ministers and the head of government, Michel Barnier. The plan will include “better organization of specialized courts, new means of investigation for law enforcement and magistrates”of the “additional measures” on detainees, minors and illicit online content, the Prime Minister detailed in X.
“More police, more repression and no results”
The two men will have to search “a transpartisan consensus” based on the bill by senators Etienne Blanc (Les Républicains, Rhône) and Jérôme Durain (Socialist Party, Saône and Loire), which he received last week. The text, which must be examined on January 27, 2025 by the Senate, proposes in particular to recalibrate the Anti-Narcotics Office (Ofast) to turn it into a true “French DEA”which bears the name of the US drug control agency, and create a national anti-narcotics prosecutor’s office (Pnast). The Insoumis and the Socialists have simultaneously put on the table a series of proposals to fight organized crime and drug trafficking, including the legalization of cannabis, a “health approach” and additional resources.
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On the ground, expectations are enormous. “What would happen if we signaled the end of this show that began several months ago? Several ministers came, Emmanuel Macron came and, in the end, each time, with the same response: more police, more repression and without results. […]. What people ask is that we talk about their housing, about security in the neighborhoods, about the responsibility of social property owners.”Amine Kessaci, spokesperson for the Conciencia association, was outraged on RTL.
“We must review texts, organizations and media in response to the violence that has become limitless, to the corruption of minds and practices, to the financial impact of networks”estimated Franck Rastoul, attorney general of the Court of Appeal of Aix-en-Provence. Another judicial source mentioned “a suffocation of the judicial system”believing that only in Marseille “750 arrested and prosecuted” They constitute organized crime. “The fight against drug trafficking is a great national cause and we must change course. But does the budgetary context allow it? »he wonders.
In 2023, 49 deaths related to drug trafficking were recorded in Marseille, including seven minors, a record. Most of these murders took place in the context of a war between the DZ Mafia and Yoda gangs for control of drug sales outlets. Since the beginning of the year, 17 narcocides have been recorded in the city. This gang war involves increasingly younger teenagers.
