French government efforts to expand voter rolls in its South Pacific territory of New Caledonia — which triggered deadly riots in May — threaten the rights of the indigenous Kanaks, UN experts warned.
A wave of rioting and looting erupted over a proposed update of the electoral roll to include people originally from outside the territory but with more than 10 years of residency.
Indigenous Kanak people fear the plan will leave them in a permanent minority, putting independence hopes out of reach.
The bill presented by the French interior ministry “threatens to dismantle other achievements of the Noumea Accord relating to the recognition of the Kanak Indigenous identity, Kanak customary institutions as well as customary law and land rights”, four UN special rapporteurs said in a joint statement Tuesday.
Eleven people have been killed since the unrest broke out. The riots caused 2.2 billion euros ($2.45 billion) of damage, while France sent thousands of troops and police to the archipelago almost 17,000 kilometres (10,600 miles) from Paris to restore order.
Lying between Australia and Fiji, New Caledonia is one of several French territories spanning the globe from the Caribbean and Indian Ocean to the Pacific in the post-colonial era.
The 1998 Noumea Accord saw France vow to gradually give more political power to the territory’s nearly 300,000 people.
The Noumea Accord has also meant that New Caledonia’s voter lists have not been updated since 1998 — depriving island residents who arrived since then of a vote in provincial polls.
“The attempt to dismantle the Noumea Accord severely undermines their human rights and the integrity of the overall decolonisation process,” the experts said.
UN special rapporteurs are independent experts in their fields, mandated by the Human Rights Council to report to the UN’s top rights body. They therefore do not speak for the United Nations.
The electoral change — which requires altering the French constitution — has effectively been in limbo since President Emmanuel Macron called new elections in July that produced a parliament with no clear majority.
The UN experts called for the complete repeal of the bill rather than merely its suspension.
Agreements made under the Noumea Accord “must be constitutionally guaranteed until New Caledonia achieves full sovereignty in accordance with France’s commitment”, the experts said.
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