Overview

• France's Justice Minister Gérald Darmanin announced detailed plans for a €400 million super-max prison in Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni, French Guiana, with a 2028 completion target.
• The facility will house 500 inmates, including 60 maximum-security spaces, 15 of which are reserved for Islamic militants, aiming to isolate high-risk criminals.
• The project is intended to address severe prison overcrowding and combat rising drug trafficking in the region, a major transit point for cocaine to Europe.
• Local officials, including the acting president of French Guiana’s territorial assembly, criticized the plan as imposed without consultation and evoking colonial-era grievances.
• MP Jean-Victor Castor condemned the decision as a 'colonial regression,' while officials called for France to reconsider the project.