2023-11-28 13:00:10
On a deal point, in Villerupt (Meurthe-et-Moselle), May 14, 2023. Drug prices are written on a wall. SEBASTIEN BOZON / AFP
In a small Senate room with tables arranged in a U, they swore to say “the whole truth and nothing but the truth”. Transparency on the scale of drug trafficking in France: this is what was expected from the directors of the national police, the Anti-Narcotics Office (Ofast) and the gendarmerie, summoned on Monday November 27 for the first hearings of the drug commission. Senate investigation into “the impact of drug trafficking in France and the measures to be taken to remedy it”.
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By way of observation, they drew up a portrait, in three voices, of a threat of “historically high level”according to Stéphanie Cherbonnier, head of Ofast, who specifies that“no territory in France is spared”. Senators will have to conclude their work on May 8, 2024, hoping to propose legislative initiatives to counter a situation that inspires “worry”according to the socialist senator from Saône-et-Loire Jérôme Durain, president of this commission requested by the Les Républicains (LR) group.
Frédéric Veaux, director general of the national police, first highlights the “capitalist and ultraliberal logic of traffickers”in a “market today dominated by criminal groups from disadvantaged neighborhoods”. Gangs capable of collaborating with foreign criminal structures such as the Mocro Maffia, a Dutch organization of Moroccan origin, or Albanian groups. Among their strengths, “corrupting capacity” present ” everywhere “ – targeting port and airport employees, public officials, etc. “No profession is spared”will add Ms. Cherbonnier.
“Logics of vendetta”
The growing and uncontrolled violence, the common thread of the senators’ questions, is supported by a figure revealed by Mr. Veaux: the incidents of homicides or attempted homicides linked to drug trafficking have increased by 57% since the start of the year 2023 compared to the same period in 2022 – i.e. 315 cases recorded this year. He believes that this violence “is a way for the criminal enterprises that control this trafficking to establish their influence or increase it, by trying to recover markets”but also “a method of retaliation, which unfortunately settles into the logic of vendetta, the end of which we never see”.
Ms. Cherbonnier, emphasizing the influence of organized crime in the country, adds that “75 settling of scores between criminals since the start of 2023, of which between 80% and 90% are linked to drug trafficking”.
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