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The Moroccan consulate in Marseille experienced a chaotic incident on Friday, April 11. A 30-year-old Algerian man, who was in France illegally, was arrested after threatening to kill the vice-consul and assaulting a security officer, Le Journal du Dimanche reports.
According to a local source contacted by Yabiladi, the man arrived at the consulate around 2:30 p.m. on a scooter. Married to a Moroccan citizen and father to a daughter with her, he came to collect a certificate of Moroccan nationality in the child's name, presenting a receipt.
The vice-consul reportedly explained that such a document could only be issued to a parent with Moroccan nationality—in this case, his wife. The situation escalated: the man allegedly insulted the diplomat and then threatened to kill everyone present. He also reportedly said he would return with an explosive device.
A security officer, originally from Benin, intervened to try to calm the situation and was injured after being bitten in the face. He received medical treatment at a hospital and later filed a complaint.
The suspect left the consulate before police arrived. Officers only intervened after receiving permission from the consul general to enter the diplomatic premises. The man was identified and arrested at his home, located about three kilometers from the consulate, around 5:30 p.m. He was taken into custody.
According to our source, there are still questions about the suspect’s mental state at the time of the incident. The source also raised the possibility of a family dispute, which might explain his insistence on retrieving the administrative document alone.
The man, who has been in France illegally since April 2, is already known to police and appears in the national Judicial Records Processing file (TAJ), according to a police source cited by the far-right publication Valeurs actuelles.
This incident comes at a time of diplomatic tension between France, Morocco, and Algeria, fueled by disagreements over the Western Sahara issue and migration management.
