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French President Visits New Caledonia After Deadly Riots And Halts Reforms

By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News

NOUMÉA (Worthy News) – French President Emmanuel Macron rushed to riots-hit New Caledonia, where he pledged Thursday to delay voting reforms that the archipelago’s Indigenous Kanak people fear will diminish their votes and end their struggle for independence from France.

Macron’s roughly 32,000-kilometer (20,000-mile) round-trip from Paris to spend the day on the French-ruled Pacific islands came after the area’s worst unrest in years left six people dead and a trail of destruction.

The clashes broke out when Indigenous Kanak, who long sought independence from France, protested legislation in the French parliament allowing more recent arrivals in the archipelago to vote in local elections.

After a day of meetings with leaders on both sides of New Caledonia’s divide, Macron proposed a roadmap that could lead to another referendum for the territory.

Three earlier referendums between 2018 and 2021 produced “no” votes against independence.

He said another could be on a new political deal for the archipelago that he hopes local leaders will agree on in the coming weeks.

PRO-INDEPENDENCE

The referendum would come months after protesters’ barricades are dismantled, allowing for a state of emergency to be lifted and for peace to return, he said.

“I am committed to ensuring that this reform will not be implemented by force,” Macron added in front of the French High Commission building.

Pro-independence Kanak leaders, who declined Macron’s offer of talks by video a week earlier, joined a meeting the French leader hosted in the capital, Nouméa.

They met rival pro-Paris leaders who wanted New Caledonia, which became French in 1853 under Emperor Napoleon III, to remain part of France.

Their talks were closely watched by other nations in the Pacific region and beyond, with Australia and New Zealand sending airplanes to New Caledonia to begin bringing home stranded citizens from the violence-wracked French South Pacific territory.

“We are giving ourselves a few weeks to allow for calm, the resumption of dialogue, with a view to a global agreement,” stressed Macron.

HEADACHE DOSSIER

Yet, as he returns to Paris following his whirlwind tour, New Caledonia remains a daunting dossier for him: Both French houses of parliament in Paris have already approved the voting overhaul.

The next step was to have an extraordinary Congress of both houses meeting in Versailles to implement it by amending France’s Constitution. That had been expected by the end of June.

But Macron’s comments in the New Caledonian capital, Nouméa, suggested he was willing to change course and buy more time for an alternate deal, analysts said.

Macron also said police sent in to help battle deadly unrest over the voting reforms in the French Pacific archipelago “will stay as long as necessary.”

Yet their arrival comes as security services are also needed back in France to safeguard the upcoming Paris Olympics

By canceling his previously announced schedule to fly across the globe from Paris to New Caledonia, Macron brought the weight of his office to bear on the crisis.