The Minister of the Interior wants to better protect undocumented women from their violent partners.
Tuesday, November 23, Gérald Darmanin announced to France Inter that he was going to ask the prefects on Thursday for the regularization of women who are in France in an irregular situation, and of whom it is proven that they are victims of domestic violence.
"
These women are perhaps too often hesitant to go to a police station or a gendarmerie brigade, to seize the public prosecutor to say 'I was raped' or 'I am beaten by my husband and I want to file a complaint'
», Regretted the minister.
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Gérald Darmanin also recalled that women who arrived in France thanks to family reunification benefit from specific protection in the event of violence.
It takes the form of a residence permit, "
today granted to 220, 250 people per year
".
"
Obviously, we could do much more and much better,
" the minister told France Inter.
A residence permit granted in the event of a conviction
In the case of women in an irregular situation, "
if justice comes to show that the person against whom the complaint is lodged is, in fact, responsible for rape, domestic violence, we undertake to regularize these women in the name of the protection we owe them,
”said Gérald Darmanin. In fact, in accordance with article L313-12 of the code for the entry and stay of foreigners and the right to asylum (Ceseda), a woman victim of violence, if she is not yet the holder of a residence permit, has the possibility of being granted a residence permit "
private and family life
», Provided that it does not present a threat to public order.
A residence permit may even be granted if the spouse is definitively convicted of the alleged acts, according to article L316-4 of the same Ceseda.
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"
If you are undocumented in France, you have the right to lodge a complaint,
" recalls the Minister of the Interior.
“
And it is not because you will file a complaint in a police station that you will be using your undocumented status to deport you
”.
And to add: "
Not only [the police and gendarmes] must take these complaints, and as long as the complaint is not fully studied, these women cannot be expelled from the territory of the Republic
".
A specific title for women from family reunification
The instructions given by Gérald Darmanin to the prefects will also concern women who have arrived legally in the territory through family reunification. Usually, in the event of a termination of cohabitation not resulting from the death of one of the spouses, the residence permit of these women can be withdrawn. But “
when you come to France on your husband's residence permit, for example in the name of family reunification, there is already a specific permit, which allows you to give a“ family violence ”residence permit, while the investigation can come to an end and especially the time that we can take care of your husband independently of you, and keep you on the national territory
”, argued the minister to France Inter.
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In fact, in accordance with article L431-2 of Ceseda, “
when the foreigner has suffered domestic or conjugal violence and the community of life has been severed, the administrative authority cannot withdraw the residence permit of the foreigner admitted for a stay under family reunification and grants its renewal
”.