French MPs started to debate President Emmanuel Macron’s anti-terrorism bill on Monday, with a big divide between those on the right who want the bill to go further, and voices from the left saying it will create a “permanent state of emergency”, reports FRANCE 24.
Macron’s government has argued that the legislation is necessary because France’s state of emergency cannot be “renewed indefinitely”. It has been in force since the November 2015 Paris terrorist attacks – and was renewed for a sixth time in July, extending it until the end of October.
That will make this France’s longest state of emergency since the Algerian War of Independence.
In an interview with AFP, Interior Minister Gérard Collomb insisted that the legislation would end the state of emergency at the same time as keeping powers to “protect our fellow citizens from terrorism” while “the threat remains strong”.
He also said that “long-term policies were needed to “permanently eradicate the influence of Daesh [the Islamic State group]”.
The bill aims to put aspects of the temporary state of emergency onto the statute books. Authorities would keep their powers to search property, put terrorist suspects under house arrest and shut down places of worship linked to terrorism.
Parliament will review these powers in 2020 in light of the “evolving situation”.
But opposition parties – in particular the conservative Les Républicains (LR) and hard left La France Insoumise (LFI) – have tabled a total of 480 amendments to the bill, to be debated from Monday until Thursday ahead of a vote on 3 October.
Many MPs from Macron’s La République En Marche (LREM) support the bill. One said that the bill is “responsible and courageous” and therefore the party will only make a few minor changes.