Hundreds of Australian and New Zealand tourists stranded in New Caledonia amid deadly unrest are anxiously waiting on French authorities to allow air travel out of the territory, as their governments stand by to bring them home.
French security forces are working to retake control of the highway to the international airport in New Caledonia, shuttered because of violent unrest in the French Pacific territory.
France’s top official in the territory, Louis Le Franc, said on Sunday evening that a police operation to regain control of the road to the airport would take several days. Gendarmes had dismantled 76 roadblocks.
But pro-independence forces on Monday vowed to maintain roadblocks that have paralysed parts of the territory.
The airport, with routes to Australia, Singapore, New Zealand and other destinations, closed on Tuesday as protests against voting reforms opposed by pro-independence supporters degenerated into widespread violence, leaving a vast trail of destruction. Six people have been killed and hundreds injured.
A reopening of the Nouméa-La Tontouta airport could allow stranded tourists to escape from the island, where armed clashes, arson and looting has prompted France to impose a state of emergency.
Roughly 3,000 tourists are thought to be marooned in New Caledonia, according to AFP, including more than 300 Australians and nearly 250 New Zealanders.
Australia’s prime minister, Anthony Albanese, said the situation in New Caledonia was “deeply concerning”.
After a night when there was fire and looting, Albanese told ABC radio on Monday that Australia had been seeking approval from French authorities for two days to send an evacuation flight to New Caledonia to pick up tourists stranded in hotels.
“We continue to pursue approvals because the Australian defence force is ready to fly when it’s permitted to do so,” he said.
The foreign ministers of Australia and New Zealand said they were seeking French permission to fly out their nationals.
“French authorities advise the situation on the ground is preventing flights,” the Australian minister, Penny Wong, posted on X. “We continue to pursue approvals.”
Wong later tweeted on Monday night that the government had upgraded its travel advice, telling Australians “to reconsider their need to travel to all of New Caledonia, in addition to the Noumea metro area”.
She said that she and New Zealand’s foreign minister, Winston Peters, had spoken with their French counterpart, Stéphane Séjourné, “to convey our condolences, express our gratitude for French efforts to restore calm, and reiterate our request for access”.
Peters said New Zealand authorities had completed preparations for defence force aircraft to bring home nationals while commercial services were grounded.
“We are ready to fly, and await approval from French authorities as to when our flights are safe to proceed,” Peters posted on X.
“Ever since the security situation in New Caledonia deteriorated earlier this week, the safety of New Zealanders there has been an urgent priority for us.”
Tourists have described sheltering in hotels and growing concerns over food supplies, while residents have spoken of their desperate attempts to acquire food and fuel.
New Zealander Mike Lightfoot told the Guardian he had arrived in New Caledonia eight days ago for a short holiday with his wife.
One day into their trip, Lightfoot’s wife became ill at the same time rioting started, resulting in a harrowing taxi journey to get medical care.
“We came over the rise into town and there were rioters everywhere … the streets were on fire.”
The taxi driver attempted another route back to the hotel but was met with a bonfire burning in the middle of a roundabout, and hundreds more people.
“The smoke was so black you could not see ahead. The taxi driver moved slowly ahead. [Someone] whacked the car with a flagpole,” he said. “It was extremely intimidating and frightening.”
The couple is staying at a hotel alongside another 56 stranded New Zealanders. Lightfoot said they were feeling safe but, like many tourists, were eager to go home.
“People are sort of over it now – we’ve got people here that are young mums and young children. There are parents at home that are stressing about what is happening and we’re really, really looking forward to coming home.”
Australian Tonia Scholes spoke to the Project program on Sunday, and said Noumea “was like a war zone”.
“There’s burnt cars, there’s barricades, there’s remnants of fires, there’s people standing on street corners drinking hard liquor and having what almost seems like a party.”.
Scholes said local residents in the neighbourhood where she was staying with friends had taken security into their own hands.
“They have all banded together to protect what is theirs and they have 24-hour watches, they walk the streets with big torches. That’s actually our neighbours protecting us, which is just amazing that they’ve embraced us in their neighbourhood, a bunch of Australian girls here for a week and they’re just like, ‘Don’t worry, we’ve got your back.’”
But Scholes said getting solid information from the Australian government about evacuation options had been difficult.
“We’re just hoping and waiting for a phone call to say we’ve got some way of getting you out.”
Brisbane woman Sophie Jones Bradshaw flew to New Caledonia – to where she had travelled for more than 20 years – for work on 11 May, just before the outbreak of rioting. She was now separated from her family, with no idea when they would be reunited.
“It’s getting really hard to see my son every day on the camera,” Jones Bradshaw told Australian Associated Press.
“I’m crying because he wants me to go home – I’m telling him ,‘Oh just one more sleep, one more sleep’, but I don’t know.”
Jones Bradshaw said the Caledonian capital was “desolation, it’s chaos – it’s frightening”. “It feels like a no man’s land.”
She said half of Noumea has been burnt, with homes and businesses razed across the city.
“You have to go further and further out to find a shop that hasn’t been burned or is not closed.
“In the middle of all that, you can still hear explosions every now and then. I feel exhausted and scared, like any Caledonian.”
