European Observatory to Combat Radicalization – EOCR
French prison opens anti-radicalization unit for women
lemonde.fr – Fourteen cells, isolated from the rest of the detention facility at Roanne prison, will hold female returnees from Syria.This used to be the nursery in Roanne prison. It is now a special section of the facility that tackles radicalization – “quartier de prise en charge de la radicalization” or “radicalisation support area” (QPR).
It has been designed to receive female jihadists, including the approximately 50 “returnees” repatriated to France from Syria between July 2022 and July 2023 by French authorities. It comprises 14 new cells completely isolated from the rest of the prison in this town northwest of Lyon.The QPR is the second in the country reserved for women, following the opening in September 2021 of a similar 16-place unit in Rennes.
There are already six centers of this type for men in France, including one specializing in preparation for release from detention.The Roanne center will welcome its first female inmates in the last week of January. “We will initially be taking in four women,” said Sylvie Marion, a former head of the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes inter-regional unit for combating violent radicalization, who recently took over the management of Roanne prison.
“On completion of the renovations on December 21, 2023, representing an investment of more than €1 million, this part of the women’s building was sealed off from the rest of the facility in terms of sound, and visual and physical impact.”To access it, you must pass through an octagonal interlock, which leads to a corridor lined with cells with blue doors, on either side of the gray-floored aisle. One is equipped to accommodate disabled inmates.
At the far end of the QPR is a room equipped with a screen for family or legal videoconferencing, and a small library next door. A collection of hadiths (sayings of the Prophet Muhammad) from the Quran sits alongside a biography of French astronaut Thomas Pesquet, a Scrabble game, a book on Algerian cuisine, La Laïcité pour les nuls (“Secularism for Dummies”) and Femme, Vie, Liberté (Woman, Life, Freedom) a graphic novel by French-Iranian writer Marjane Satrapi. A separate exercise yard and meeting rooms are also available.
European Observatory to Combat Radicalization – EOCR
