Published on
04/06/2025 – 17:52 GMT+2
Shock over the homicide of a Tunisian hairdresser in a village close to the French Riviera remaining weekend continues to reverberate all through the Western European nation, as government condemn the crime as fuelled via hatred.
After the 46-year-old Hichem Miraoui used to be shot lifeless close to his house in Puget-sur-Argens in southern France on Saturday, one in all his neighbours has claimed accountability for the assault, by which a person of Turkish background used to be additionally injured.
In movies posted on Facebook in a while prior to his arrest, the suspect, recognized as Christophe B, 53, used racist language and seemed to incite French electorate to behavior additional acts of violence in opposition to Muslims.
French Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau stated on Tuesday that the homicide used to be “clearly a racist crime”, “probably also anti-Muslim” and “perhaps also a terrorist crime”.
The nationwide anti-terrorism prosecutor’s place of business (PNAT), which opened in 2019, introduced a probe into the killing this week, the primary time it has performed so for a homicide this is idea to had been impressed via far-right ideology.
Since Miraoui’s homicide, Muslim communities throughout France have spoken in their unhappiness and concern.
In a observation launched on Tuesday, the Rhône Council of Mosques stated the crime used to be indicative of the “troubling and increasingly hostile climate toward citizens of Muslim faith in France”.
Meanwhile, Hafiz Chems-Eddine, Rector of the Grand Mosque of Paris, referred to as for “urgent, national awareness of the dangers of xenophobic, racist, and Islamphobic rhetoric”.
“It is time to question the promoters of this hatred, who, in the political and media spheres, operate with impunity and lead to extremely serious incidents,” he stated.
Islamic leaders additionally made a connection between Miraoui’s homicide and the deadly stabbing of the 22-year-old Malian Aboubakar Cissé in a mosque in southern France on 25 April.
In a video filmed whilst Cissé used to be death, his French attacker criticised Islam.
