For over a month now, the Gaîté Lyrique Theater in Paris, France, has been taken over by a group of homeless migrants who needed a roof over their heads during winter.

The occupation of Gaîté Lyrique began on 10 December when the cultural venue hosted a free conference titled “Reinventing the Welcome for Refugees in France”. Ironically, the 250 African migrants who attended the event refused to leave after it was over, and they were later joined by another 50 or so migrants who didn’t have anywhere else to hide from the cold Paris weather. It’s been over a month since the Gaîté Lyrique was occupied, and management admits that it was forced to cancel all performances until at least January 24, which threatens to bankrupt it, as the institution relies on such performances for 70% of its income, with the other 30% coming from the state as subsidies.

Despite suffering losses estimated in the hundreds of thousands of euros in December alone and struggling to cover the salaries of its 60-something employees, the Gaîté Lyrique Theater has issued a statement deeming it “unthinkable” to “throw these people out onto the street in the middle of winter”. The theater has requested the assistance of the French Government and local authorities to find suitable shelter for the hundreds of migrants squatting at Gaîté Lyrique.

“While we regret the occupation of the Gaîté Lyrique, we wish to affirm our support for the young adults without housing who have found refuge in the establishment,” a statement released by the Paris City Hall reads. “The City refuses to implement dry evictions: these social emergency situations require social responses and, therefore, suitable accommodation places.”

 

A banner on the front of the occupied Paris theater reads“Housing emergency, isolated minors on the streets!” and the collective that claims to represent the squatting migrants says that the vast majority of them are minors, which means they fall under French welfare organizations’ obligation to offer them shelter and assistance, according to French law. However, according to newspapers like Le Figaro, most of them were homeless adults who had registered with French social services.

French media have been trying to gain access to the Gaîté Lyrique Theater and speak with representatives of the migrants, but so far their efforts have proven fruitless. Le Figaro claims that a representative of the migrant collective told its employees that access is given exclusively by the theater, which chose to voluntarily close down to allow the migrants to stay there, while the theater said that press access is given by the delegates of the collective.