FRENCH PRESIDENT Nicolas Sarkozy has told his government to draft a law to allow for the French citizenship of immigrants who endanger the life of a police officer to be revoked. He ruled out a suggestion by his interior minister that the same punishment should apply to polygamists.
After a meeting on crime and immigration with relevant ministers at the Elysée Palace yesterday, Mr Sarkozy announced a series of measures he wanted to see implemented “as soon as possible”.
The state’s right to revoke citizenship will be expanded to include immigrants who make an attempt on the life of a police officer or another representative of the state, provided they had been naturalised in the decade prior to the offence. This can only be done at present in cases of terrorism or treason.
Mr Sarkozy first proposed reversing the naturalisation of immigrants convicted of threatening the lives of police in Grenoble in July, in response to three days of urban riots in the Alpine city after police shot dead a suspected armed robber.
On polygamy, Mr Sarkozy called for a tightening of sanctions against those who abused the social security system, but dropped a proposal by interior minister Brice Hortefeux to revoke offenders’ citizenship.
The president also said he wanted to reform laws to allow immigrants in an irregular situation to be returned to the border, “including, in certain circumstances, those who come from within the European Union”.
Tens of thousands of demonstrators protested in several cities last Saturday against Mr Sarkozy’s recent security crackdown, which has included the highly publicised rounding-up and expulsion of illegal Roma migrants.
An opinion poll for Le Figaro published shortly after the Grenoble speech found nearly three-quarters of voters supported his tough proposals, however.
Critics suggest any attempt to revoke French citizenship could be thrown out by the constitutional council because it breaches the principle that all French citizens are equal before the law regardless of race, creed or origin.
However, the council did uphold an exception in the 1990s, allowing the removal of citizenship from immigrants convicted of acts of terrorism.