Yesterday around 70 immigrant squatters and protesters have stormed the Vatican Embassy in Paris in protest against the church and its decision to evict squatters from an empty church in Lille to “preserve the sacred space”. Many of the squatters are now on hunger strike.
The protest started mid-morning as the squatters pushed their way through police and security staff into the Embassy. They unfurled a banner through an upstairs window that read, “Jesus defended the stranger. What have you Christians done for your undocumented brothers?” The protesters decided that they had ‘made their point’, and finally left the building two hours later.
No arrests were made by the attending riot police, but a spokesperson said that:
“The invasion of a sacred diplomatic space was being viewed with extreme seriousness”.
The protest was organised by a group called the ‘9th collection of the undocumented’ who are fighting against France’s immigration and naturalisation laws, and the eviction and deportation of thousands of Roma travellers that was started by Sarkozy and then continued by the faux Socialist Hollande government.
The Arab spring has led to the displacement of thousands of people, many of whom have found their way to France. Unfortunately becoming a ‘legal’ immigrant in France, access to housing etc is increasingly difficult.
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