“There is no taboo question if it is to be effective in protecting the French,” declared, in an interview with the Journal du Dimanche (JDD) dated October 22, Gérald Darmanin, Minister of the Interior, interviewed at subject of the limits imposed by the Constitution or European jurisprudence in matters of immigration.
Mr. Darmanin is the first minister of his rank to speak in the columns of the weekly since the arrival at its head of far-right journalist Geoffroy Lejeune, after weeks of strike and massive departures within the editorial staff.
The minister was questioned at length in particular about his statements concerning the limits placed by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) on the expulsion of certain foreign nationals. The day after the assassination of a professor in Arras by a radicalized Russian of Ingush origin, Mr. Darmanin said he “assume[r]” to be condemned by the court for the resumption of expulsions of nationals from the Caucasus registered S to the Russia, as was the case for two Chechens in August 2022.
Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights prohibits States from subjecting a person to inhuman or degrading punishment or treatment. “The ECHR must understand that it is judging in a terrorist crisis situation which did not exist when its rules were imagined,” retorts the minister to the JDD. He notes, however, that the ECHR “does not prevent [him] from doing [his] job as Minister of the Interior”, arguing that he respects “all the rules of the rule of law” and the Court.
“Measures of justice”
The three-page interview is largely devoted to the immigration bill, the examination of which in the Senate will begin on November 6. With the JDD, Mr. Darmanin defended the “strongest text with the toughest measures in the last thirty years”.
Asked about article 3 of this article, devoted to professions in tension, Gérald Darmanin said he was ready to “discuss”. “However, the situation is serious enough for us to have to compromise on things that are not central,” declared the minister. “Some want a decree or a circular, others want it to be in the law. We will therefore discuss this subject like all others, but the government is committed to measures of justice towards those who produce in our country without ever posing a problem of public order,” he explained.
While the path to adoption of his text by Parliament is narrow, notably due to firm opposition from the right, the minister seemed to refer a hypothetical failure to an “extreme left tempted to make filibuster” in the Assembly. “So far all my texts have been adopted without 49.3 (…). It is up to the Prime Minister to decide whether or not she holds her government accountable,” he said.