SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGEN­CIES

● French min­is­ter for over­seas ter­ri­to­ries is hold­ing talks in Guade­loupe amid days of protests over COVID curbs ●

(AL JAZEERA) — France is send­ing ad­di­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty forces to the French Caribbean is­land of Guade­loupe, as the coun­try’s min­is­ter re­spon­si­ble for over­seas ter­ri­to­ries met with union lead­ers to try to defuse days of un­rest over COVID-19 re­stric­tions.

In a state­ment on Mon­day, Se­bastien Lecor­nu said he met with four union rep­re­sen­ta­tives, who hand­ed him a list of their de­mands. But the min­istry said the union lead­ers failed to de­nounce re­cent vi­o­lence, in­clud­ing at­tacks on po­lice and oth­er se­cu­ri­ty of­fi­cers.

“The con­di­tion for di­a­logue is for all po­lit­i­cal and trade unions to con­demn the vi­o­lence, and more specif­i­cal­ly, at­tempts to mur­der” the of­fi­cers, the state­ment reads.

Pro­test­ers in Guade­loupe and neigh­bour­ing Mar­tinique have erect­ed bar­ri­cades and blocked roads this month as anger mount­ed over an or­der al­so in place in main­land France re­quir­ing health work­ers to be vac­ci­nat­ed against COVID-19.

France on Fri­day post­poned the manda­to­ry vac­ci­na­tion re­quire­ment un­til De­cem­ber 31 to al­low for di­a­logue.

“If the law of the Re­pub­lic is to ap­ply to all French de­part­ments, and there­fore to Guade­loupe and Mar­tinique, the de­tails of its ap­pli­ca­tion must be adapt­ed to the health and so­cial sit­u­a­tion of these two ter­ri­to­ries,” the health min­istry said in a state­ment an­nounc­ing the move.

But the un­rest has con­tin­ued, and lat­er on Mon­day, Lecor­nu said 70 ad­di­tion­al of­fi­cers, as well as 10 more mem­bers of a spe­cial SWAT-like unit, would be de­ployed to Guade­loupe as of Tues­day to help re­spond to the sit­u­a­tion.

Nu­mer­ous ar­rests have been re­port­ed in Guade­loupe and Mar­tinique since the protests be­gan.

Shots al­so were fired at po­lice last week in Mar­tinique, where a coali­tion of 17 trade union or­gan­i­sa­tions launched a gen­er­al strike this month in protest of the COVID-19 curbs. They are al­so call­ing for salary in­creas­es and low­er gas prices.

Mar­tinique and Guade­loupe, is­lands of 375,000 and 400,000 peo­ple, re­spec­tive­ly, are con­sid­ered for­mal parts of France whose in­hab­i­tants hold French cit­i­zen­ship and are al­lo­cat­ed rep­re­sen­ta­tion in the French Na­tion­al As­sem­bly.

But the ter­ri­to­ries suf­fer high­er pover­ty and un­em­ploy­ment rates than main­land France, and the protests have put a spot­light on lo­cal anger over broad­er is­sues with the French gov­ern­ment.