French journalist Aurélie Selvi reported that on Saturday November 6th, a group who call themselves, “Pré-Occupants” (Occupants) seized an abandoned building in downtown Nice, France for homeless asylum seekers.

According to the story, there are more than one hundred asylum seekers in the streets of Nice. The French authorities do not care about the situation and because of this, the members of a local French NGO decided to act. They seized a five story building which is owned by Nice city hospital. There have been 15 families in the building, some of which are Chechen and Ingush asylum seekers.

“After the streets, it is very comfortable,” said a mother of 7 children who fled from Chechnya with her husband.

“The important thing is that their children will have a roof over their heads after school. At least they will stay here until the end of winter break, March 15. There is a court case and the decision will come at a later date due to winter weather conditions. No one can evict these people without a decision from the court,” says Michel Abada, head of a local association, Children of Don Quixote (l’association Les enfants de Don Quichotte).

However, Christian Estrosi, mayor of Nice, and Francis Lamy, prefect of the Alpes-Maritimes department of France, have published a joint statement and condemned the “illegal occupation” at the building. Another condemnation message was published by Eric Ciotti, president of the city council. “I want to say that the occupational attitude of asylum seekers is shocking; they arrived in our country to seek asylum but now, do not hesitate to violate the laws of the Republic,” said Mr. Ciotti.

*Text was translated by Waynakh Online and edited by Michael Capobianco