According to police and association sources, people at the Mesnil-Amelot administrative detention center (CRA), next to Roissy airport, started a major fire there on Wednesday.
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According to Cimade, a solidarity association present on the scene, two men set fire to contest a court decision keeping them at the CRA because they had refused a PCR test necessary for their expulsion from French territory.
A police source reported a "
riot
" between 11 am and noon at the CRA "
involving 70 people who set fire to two buildings
".
An investigation is underway to identify the perpetrators of the fire, which caused "
significant material damage
", for its part told AFP the prosecutor's office in Meaux.
The incident was not injured, neither on the side of the police nor on the side of the detained migrants.
According to Cimade, an association supporting migrants and refugees which has an on-site branch, a Congolese and an Egyptian "
set fire to their room
" to protest against a judicial sentence returning them to CRA.
After spending three months in the center, the maximum period of detention, they were notified of an obligation to leave the territory.
However, pandemic obliges, many countries require that a negative test be presented to them by the French authorities when returning people in an irregular situation.
"
They refused to do the PCR tests and the judge of freedoms and detention considered that it was an obstruction to the removal measure
," said Mathilde Godoy, an official of the Cimade.
In fact, for the past few months, many migrants have refused screening for the new coronavirus in order to escape deportation.
