More than 300 people demonstrated on Sunday between Le Pré-Saint-Gervais (Seine-Saint-Denis) and Paris to demand the shelter of a hundred migrants including minors who have been sleeping for more than a month in a tunnel, noted an AFP journalist.
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This gathering was organized at the initiative of neighborhood residents of Pré-Saint-Gervais, Pantin and the 19th arrondissement of Paris faced with "
a situation that has become intolerable
", explains Victor Moati, an inhabitant of Pré-Saint-Gervais. .
For more than a month, he noted that the tunnel which connects his city to Paris, located under the ring road, had been taken over by nearly 150 people, "
about thirty minors and families
", specifies the young man. "
The happiness and the misfortune of this tunnel, it is that it is sheltered from the rain so people find there a makeshift accommodation in the absence of other decent proposals
", laments this local resident who says to have typed "
in vain
”at the gates of town halls and the prefecture of the Ile-de-France region.
"
Housing for all or we will sleep at Macron's!"
Chanted the demonstrators who strolled through the streets of Pré-Saint-Gervais and Pantin before meeting in front of the town hall of the 19th arrondissement.
Abass, who was part of the procession, is “
all the time cold
”.
The young Gambian, who claims to be a minor, has been sleeping in the tunnel for a month: “
I never imagined living this experience,
” he says.
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Citizen accommodation solutions are offered every evening to families and unaccompanied minors but "
this is not enough for everyone, so we are forced to set up camps every evening
", explains Pierre Mathurin, coordinator of the Parisian branch of the Utopia 56 association. “
We demand shelter for these people at least for the duration of the winter.
We must push the town halls to find emergency accommodation solutions
, ”Mr. Mathurin insisted.