Most of the people being deported are from the Comoros, who said they refused to allow a boat of deportees to dock.
A French court on Tuesday halted the controversial expulsion of migrants from a slum on Mayotte, an island territory in the Indian Ocean.
Called Operation Wuambushu (“Take Back” in the local language), the operation aimed to expel irregular migrants from Mayotte and claimed it would improve the living conditions of the local population in France’s poorest department.
Some 1,800 members of the French security forces have been deployed to the operation since Sunday, including hundreds sent from Paris. Young local residents and police have been clashing since Sunday in the Tsoundzou district outside the capital Mamoudzou.
AFP journalists reported clashes outside slums in the capital of Mayotte on Tuesday. Tire barricades and garbage cans lined the road, and protesters threw rocks at police, who fired tear gas.
A court in Mamoudzou on Tuesday halted the eviction of a slum in Koungou near the capital at the last minute, saying the action had no legal basis and threatened public liberties. The local government said it would appeal.
Locals applauded the court’s decision to halt the evacuation, which was due to take place early Tuesday.
“I’m overjoyed, we went to court and we won,” 33-year-old Mdohoma Hadja exulted, raising her arms in the air.
The Comoros, whose three islands lie northwest of Mayotte, said Monday it has not allowed a boat carrying people displaced from Mayotte to dock. Most of the people deported are Comoros.
It also said it had suspended passenger traffic at a port where the deportees usually land.
The plan is to send those without papers back to the Comorian island of Anjouan, 70 km (45 mi) away from Mayotte.
“We will not stop operations… to combat crime and unsanitary housing, with their implications for illegal immigration,” the top Paris-appointed official on Mayotte, Thierry Suquet, told reporters.
He said he hoped to “quickly resume boat deportations to Anjouan” and hoped the standoff would be ended through “dialogue”.
Intense negotiations between the Comoros and France in recent weeks had raised the possibility of a last-minute deal.
But Comoros leader Azali Assoumani — who has held the rotating presidency of the African Union since February — said he hoped the operation would be discontinued, admitting that Moroni did not have “the means to stop the operation by force.” ”.
In 2019, France pledged 150 million euros ($161 million) in development aid as part of a deal to tackle human trafficking and facilitate the repatriation of Comoros from Mayotte.
About half of Mayotte’s approximately 350,000 residents are estimated to be foreign, most of them from the Comoros.
Many Africans, especially Comoros, try to reach Mayotte every year. These risky crossings threaten to end in tragedy when the “kwasa kwassa”, small motorized fishing boats used by people smugglers, are shipwrecked.
Mayotte is the fourth island of the Comoros archipelago that France retained after an initial referendum in 1974, but it continues to be claimed by Moroni.