Murder of Paris student fuels anger over failed deportation

The murder of a 19-year-old student in an exclusive Paris district has sparked new calls from the French right for tougher immigration policy.

The body of the young woman, who is only called Philippine, was found half-buried in the Bois de Boulogne park on the western edge of the capital on Saturday.

She was last seen on Friday afternoon a few hundred meters away as she left the campus of the University of Paris-Dauphine, where she was studying economics.

The trail of the suspected murderer led to Geneva, where he was arrested on Tuesday and is now awaiting deportation to France.

He is a 22-year-old Moroccan who was released from custody in France earlier this month after serving a five-year sentence for the rape of a student in 2019.

The French media called him Taha O. An expulsion order from France had been issued against him, but it was not enforced.

This is a first test for new French Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau, a hardliner, after he took office last week with a promise that his three main priorities would be to “establish order, establish order and establish order”.

“It is up to us as public officials… to change our legal arsenal to protect the French,” he said on the social media platform X.

The far-right Rassemblement National (RN) viewed the murder as further evidence of the laxity of the French justice system.

“This migrant had no right to be here, but he was able to commit further crimes with total impunity. Our justice system is too lenient; our state is dysfunctional. It is time for the government to act,” said RN President Jordan Bardella.

With more than 120 MPs, the RN has leverage over Prime Minister Michel Barnier's minority government, as it can decide at any time to support a vote of no confidence and potentially bring it down.

Some left-wing politicians also joined the call for more effective enforcement of deportation orders.

The suspect “should have gone straight from prison to the plane,” said Socialist Party leader Olivier Faure.

Currently, according to government figures, less than 10 percent of deportation orders in France are being enforced.

Sandrine Rousseau of the Ecologists described the murder as a “feminicide” that must be “severely punished”, but warned that the extreme right would “exploit it to spread its racist and xenophobic hatred”.

Philippine's disappearance prompted an alert on a phone app called The Sorority, whose network of members is committed to helping women in need.

The app was not available in the Philippines, but the sorority said it issued a “missing person notice” on Saturday to encourage members to join the search.

Philippine was on her way home to her parents' house west of Paris when she disappeared. Her classmates described her as a quiet, model student and she was active in the Boy Scout movement.

Her murder has raised fears about security in the Bois de Boulogne, which borders the expensive districts of Paris' 16th arrondissement. district (District).

The park has long been a center of prostitution, but residents say some parts of the park have become increasingly frightening in recent years due to the presence of drug addicts and other suspicious characters.