End of the illegal occupation of the Lejuc Wood
On 22 February 2018, the authorities evacuated the Lejuc Wood, which belongs to Andra and was illegally occupied by opponents of the Cigeo project. Following the operation, Andra was once again able to access the wood in order to assess the damage and begin cleanup operations.
Located in the municipality of Mandres en Barrois, the Lejuc Wood may be the site of Cigeo’s “shafts” facility, one of two surface facilities. It would serve as an operations base for shafts and drifts excavation work and house infrastructure and buildings for the construction site as well as for operation and maintenance of the underground facility. Owned by Andra following an exchange with the municipality, the wood had been occupied by opponents of the project since the summer of 2016. The courts recognised the illegal nature of the occupation and the authorities ended it by removing the fifteen or so persons present on 22 February 2018.
Restoring order and resuming consultation
Sébastien Lecornu, Secretary of State to Minister for Ecological and Inclusive Transition Nicolas Hulot, was on site to meet local stakeholders, stating, “The Government has restored order so that the consultation which has been in progress since 1990 can resume,” and recalled that the Cigeo project is “a project of national interest hosted by the Meuse and Haute-Marne departments. The State and the nation are both grateful. We will support the inhabitants, the elected officials, the economic stakeholders, over the long term.”
For her part, Muriel Nguyen, Prefect of the Meuse department, confirmed the implementation of “appropriate, proportionate and long-term security measures to prevent the risk of breaches of the peace, to secure the entire sector and to reassure the population.”
« The Government has restored order so that the consultation which has been in progress since 1990 can resume »