Several French prisons were attacked overnight in response to government efforts to clamp down on drug trafficking in the country, senior officials said.

Unknown assailants fired automatic weapons at a prison in the southern city of Toulon, while vehicles were burned outside other facilities across the country and staff were threatened.

France’s national anti-terrorism prosecutor’s office said on Tuesday that it had taken charge of the investigation, while the country’s DGSI national security investigation will also be involved.

French media reported that the prisons targeted were in or near cities including Toulon, Aix-En-Provence, Marseille, and the communes of Valence and Nimes.

Prisons were also targeted in the commune of Villepinte and the suburb of Nanterre near Paris, according to reports.

It is not immediately clear whether the attacks were co-ordinated, or who carried them out.

France’s Justice Minister Gerald Darmanin, who has led efforts to toughen prison security and crack down on gangsters who run their empires from behind bars, said he would travel to Toulon.

“Attempts have been made to intimidate staff in several prisons, ranging from burning vehicles to firing automatic weapons,” Mr Darmanin wrote on X.

“I am going to Toulon to support the officers concerned. The French Republic is facing up to the problem of drug trafficking and is taking measures that will massively disrupt the criminal networks.”

Meanwhile, the country’s Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said he had instructed local prefects, alongside the police and gendarmerie, to immediately step up the protection of staff and prisons.

A ‘white tsunami’ of cocaine

Years of record South American cocaine imports to Europe have supercharged local drug markets, sparking a wave of drug violence across the continent.

Gangs in France have been able to expand from traditional power bases in cities like Marseille into smaller regional towns unaccustomed to drug violence.

The rise in gang crime is thought to have led to increased support for the far-right National Rally party and have helped drag French politics rightward.

Mr Darmanin, a former interior minister, and Mr Retailleau have prioritised tackling drug trafficking.

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In February, Mr Retailleau announced record cocaine seizures of 47 tonnes in the first 11 months of 2024 compared to 23 tonnes in all of 2023.

Mr Retailleau said France had been hit by a “white tsunami” that had rewritten the rules of the criminal landscape.

Meanwhile, Mr Darmanin has proposed a series of measures to tighten prison security, including isolating the country’s top 100 kingpins.

Lawmakers are also close to approving a sweeping new anti-drug trafficking law that would create a new national organised crime prosecutors’ office and give greater investigative power to police investigating drug gangs.

French authorities scored a win against drug crime in February, when they recaptured Mohamed Amra, a French fugitive known as “The Fly.”

His escape as he was being transported from prison to a court hearing resulted in the deaths of two prison guards and was seized upon by right-wing politicians as evidence that France had lost its grip on drug crime.

Katy Perry has blasted off to space along with five other women in the first all-female space crew in over sixty years. 

The Firework singer lifted off from West Texas on a Blue Origin rocket before becoming the first artist to sing in space.

Flying alongside Perry were author Lauren Sanchez, the fiancee of Blue Origin owner and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, journalist and TV presenter Gayle King, civil rights activist Amanda Nguyen, former rocket scientist Aisha Bowe, and filmmaker Kerianne Flynn.

The star-studded crew were supported on the ground by family and friends including Kris Jenner, Khloe Kardashian and Oprah Winfrey, who said she had “never been more proud” of her friend, King.

“There’s only one time all the women are going up for the first time,” Oprah said she told her friend when urging her to go on the flight, telling her she’d regret turning down the opportunity.

Weightlessness

The crew were weightless for just four minutes after passing the Karman line, a 62-mile-high boundary that is internationally recognised as the boundary of space.

They could be heard screaming as they began to feel weightless, and told each other to look at the incredible views of the moon.

As the crew were leaving space, Perry started to sing What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong.

Asked why she chose that song, she said: “It’s not about me or about me singing my songs, it was about a collective energy in there.

“It’s about this wonderful world that we see right out there and appreciating it.”

She confirmed she will be writing a song about the experience.

The descent

Three parachutes on their capsule opened up to bring them safely back down to Earth and just before they landed, an air cushion blew a cloud of dust up in the west Texas desert, giving a dramatic-looking touchdown.

“Excited as I am, I’ll be very glad when we come back down,” said self-confessed nervous flier King before liftoff.

When she exited the shuttle, the presenter kissed the floor and said: “Thank you, Jesus”.

She said it was “oddly quiet” in space, and it reminded her that people needed to “do better and be better” on Earth.

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“It was the most incredible experience of my life to be up there and see such vast darkness in space and look down on our planet,” said Flynn, through tears.

“The moon was so beautiful and I feel like that was a special gift just for me,” she said.

Donald Trump has suggested “homegrown criminals” in the US could be deported to jails in El Salvador – saying the US attorney general is “studying the laws right now”.

He made the comment while speaking alongside the Central American nation’s president, Nayib Bukele, in the White House.

The Trump administration has sent hundreds of alleged Venezuelan gang members to CECOT, a maximum security prison in El Salvador, since March.

When asked about the deportations – which were briefly blocked by a US court last month – Mr Trump said: “I’d like to go a step further.

“We also have homegrown criminals that push people into subways, hit elderly ladies on the back of the head when they’re not looking, that are absolute monsters.

“I’d like to include them in people to get out of the country.”

When pressed on the matter by a reporter, he replied: “They’re as bad as anybody that comes in. We have bad ones too. I’m all for it.”

US Attorney General Pam Bondi, who was present at the meeting, is “studying the laws right now”, the US president added.

“If we can do that, that’s good,” he said. “I’m talking about violent people, really bad people.

“We can do things with the president [of El Salvador] for less money and have great security. He does a great job with that. We have other we’re negotiating with too.”

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The Trump administration has been deporting alleged Venezuelan gang members to the El Salvador jail since mid-March, when the US president signed the Alien Enemies Act.

The law from 1798 has been invoked just three times before, in wartime. It allows the president to detain and deport immigrants living in the US legally if they are from countries seen as “enemies” of the government.

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Lawyers and immigrant rights groups have been unable to contact the men sent to the 40,000 capacity CECOT prison – the largest detention facility in Latin America.

A judge issued a temporary block on the deportations on 17 March, but this was lifted by the Supreme Court last week.