5. France Drones proposed to tackle Marseille crime A mayoral candidate has proposed the use of drones over the streets of Marseille to combat the city's notorious network of drug dealers and reputation for violent crime. Eugène Caselli -- Comments Comments Eugène Caselli, the Socialist Party president of the Marseille urban community, and mayoral candidate, proposed on Thursday that drone aircraft be used to seek out drug-dealing and violent crime on the backstreets of the city, which has been hit by a spate of murders. "Once police get intelligence on gangs of drug-dealers and how they embed themselves in the city, how they move about, and how they sell drugs, that's when it's time to deploy the drones," Mr Caselli said on French radio station Europe 1. -- "Everything is filmed, and it's better than a classic police stakeout," he added. A petition called 'Will It Take Batman To Save Marseille?', was launched after a vigilante pensioner was shot dead after he ran over robbers and then confronted them with a baseball bat and pepper spray. Criminal gangs are even known to use assault rifles, such as AK-47s, thought to be smuggled through Mediterranean ports. Mr Caselli's drone plan has the backing of police chief Jean-Paul Bonnetain, according to Europe 1, and local government authorities in the Bouches-du-Rhône department are already willing to spend €1 million (£840,000) on it, with each drone costing €50,000 a piece. -- Related Articles * Crime, corruption and cover-up in Marseille 12 Oct 2012 * Marseille mayor calls for army to tackle gang warfare 30 Aug 2012 * German railways deploys surveillance drones -- Despite these benefits, Mr Caselli's plan will have to pass legal hurdles at a national level in France, where drones are at present only used by the military. Among the concerns are fears that drones would risk invading the privacy of law-abiding Marseille residents. Police officer David-Olivier Reverdy said: "Before we send in drones, let's see exactly what the police can achieve when given proper resources to do their jobs." -- "If we have €1 million to invest in a technological solution like drones, surely we have the means to equip French police officers who are dedicated and trained to gain intelligence on criminal networks, and to break them up." Crime in Marseille has spiralled with the 13 gun murders in 2013 alone prompting the emergency deployment of 130 extra riot police and 24 more detectives. #publisher Art and design RSS feed Architecture RSS feed Travel RSS feed Marseille RSS feed Culture RSS feed Turn autoplay off -- * Architecture Marseille's £6bn Capital of Culture rebirth Marseille â the port city once notorious for gangs, drugs and violence â is in the grip of a £6bn rebirth. Will its flashy new architecture, including a giant mirror by Norman Foster, make it a worthy Capital of Culture? * Share * Tweet this -- Inverted theatre ⦠Norman Fosterâs Ombrière. Photograph: Sam Mertens The smell of cement dust and freshly caught fish wafts through the harbour of Marseille, to a backdrop of pneumatic drills and high-pressure hoses. Everywhere you look, the city is being polished and scrubbed, renovated and repainted. Roads are being resurfaced, trees are being planted, and vast new museums are rising from the ground in preparation for the European Capital of Culture 2013 â which began three months ago. "Marseille is never in a hurry," says my taxi driver, describing how the city has been a building site for the last 10 years. As he speaks, he takes a diversion around three huge holes in the ground that will soon boast a cluster of teetering towers, part of the city's new business district. The first is complete, a brooding 140m-tall edifice by Zaha Hadid for the port's largest shipping company. It stands incongruously on the low-rise skyline, a great stack of offices squeezed into a glassy, sharply curving corset of a building. It is a good metaphor for how this unruly city is trying to adjust to its slick new clothing. A bubbling bouillabaisse of Mediterranean cultures, France's second largest city has long suffered from its seedy reputation as a centre of drug-related violence. Twenty people were shot dead last year in the city's rundown housing estates, where youth unemployment is as high as 40%. But now the gang-plagued city nicknamed Rio-sur-Mer is being rebranded as Euroméditerranée, a dynamic hub of global investment, with a â¬7bn (£5.9bn) makeover â the largest regeneration project in southern Europe. -- The Villa Meditérranée by Stefano Boeri Embarrassingly shouty ⦠the Villa Meditérranée, by Stefano Boeri. Photograph: Paul Ladouce It's a philosophy of quiet intervention that does not seem to be shared by the architects operating a little way down the waterfront. Here, on the once-abandoned J4 pier, stand the flagship projects of Marseille's bid to be recognised as a cultural centre. The Villa Méditerranée, designed by Italian architect Stefano Boeri, is the first thing you see as you turn the corner of the bay, its sheer white facade butting into the dock like the rump of a cruise liner, complete with tinted oblong windows. From the other side, the building looks like a supersized diving board, with one vast exhibition hall jutting out towards the sea in a 40m-long cantilever, suspended above a pool of water in which the detritus of construction floats in forlorn clumps. So what exactly is this curious building for? It is hard to know. "The Villa Méditerranée symbolises our desire to build a place dedicated to peace and solidarity and for reflecting upon our shared destinies," proclaims Michel Vauzelle, president of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region, which has pumped â¬70m into this gargantuan project. It promises to be "a place for encounters, ideas and exchanges"; a site for citizens and experts to debate the future of the Mediterranean; an attraction where visitors will be "plunged into a subtle audiovisual experience". It was due to open mid-March; mystery still surrounds its ongoing delays and what exactly will happen within its cavernous halls. -- The Villa clamours for attention on the waterfront, the embarrassingly shouty younger sibling of its more demure neighbour, the Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilisations (Mucem). An enigmatic dark box at the end of the pier, Mucem is almost eclipsed by the Villa â a strange piece of urban planning, given that this â¬190m national museum is of greater importance, and has been planned for over 10 years. A result of the French government's decade-long decentralisation programme â which brought an undulating outpost of the Pompidou to Metz, north-eastern France, and a series of minimalist metallic sheds to the northern city of Lens for a Louvre satellite â Mucem is the first stand-alone national museum outside Paris. Due to open in June, Mucem is something of a coup for Marseille. Nestling beneath the craggy wall of Fort Saint-Jean, a 17th-century stronghold that once housed the Foreign Legion, the squat glass building is shielded from the harsh Mediterranean sun by a dark filigree veil. Stretched like a taut fishing net across the facade, this concrete shroud echoes the mashrabiya latticework screens used in much of the architecture of north Africa to keep buildings cool â an appropriate touch, given Mucem will explore the culture of this land just across the water. Rudy Riciottiâs Mucem Brilliant, brazen move ⦠Rudy Riciottiâs Mucem. Photograph: Lisa Ricciotti It is the work of Algerian-born French architect Rudy Ricciotti, a tempestuous and provocative iconoclast described by designer Philippe Starck as "a clairvoyant, untamable wild animal". Ricciotti's work has a raw energy to it, wrenching concrete into primal, twisted forms. Beneath Mucem's enveloping skin, a line of crooked, bony columns marches around the perimeter, supporting a ramping walkway. This fires out from the roof in a thin spear of concrete that stretches 115m across the water to pierce Fort Saint-Jean (the museum continues inside) and then leaps further across a gulley to connect the complex to the town. Exploiting the natural drama of Mucem's steep hillside setting, this is a brilliant, brazen move that, no matter what the museum houses, will provide one of Marseille's most thrilling new walks. The idea of creating a spiralling route, off which public spaces extend, recurs in the city's major contemporary arts centre, located on the corner of a tight urban block further into town. Designed by Japanese architect Kengo Kuma, maestro of the V&A's troubled Dundee outpost project, the new home for the Regional Contemporary Art Fund is clad in a shimmering cloud of angled glass panels. "I wanted to recreate the effect of Japanese rice-paper screens," Kuma tells me, standing in one of the triple-height gallery spaces, a hard-edged mixture of exposed concrete and metal mesh screens. "The handmade glass filters the light in a more natural way." Unfortunately, his panels do nothing of the sort, being suspended in front of a mostly opaque concrete facade. Instead, they give the building's exterior a flimsy cheapness that belies its â¬22m cost, and undermines the simple power of the sequence of galleries within. It reflects perhaps the most prominent symptom of the Capital of Culture: wherever it descends, it results in a spasm of accelerated projects, favouring exterior image and the power of spectacle over long-term, joined-up thinking. The Euroméditerranée development will continue until 2020 â in total bringing 24,000 new homes, 1m square metres of offices, and 150 acres of public space. This will no doubt give Marseille the economic boost it needs, although how far this will filter out into the impoverished peripheries is questionable. The city's bold embrace of such grands projets is, however, nothing new. When Louis XIV had Fort Saint-Jean built, way back in 1660, he said: "We noticed that the inhabitants of Marseille were extremely fond of nice fortresses." Little did he know that, 350 years on, they would still be building them. Daily Email close -- Close this popup Marseille's £6bn Capital of Culture rebirth This article was published on the Guardian website at 17.59 BST on Monday 1 April 2013. A version appeared on p16 of the G2 section of the Guardian on Tuesday 2 April 2013. It was last modified at 21.32 BST on Wednesday 3 July 2013. -- Travel * Marseille Culture More features * More on Marseille * A shiny shade structure for Marseille by Foster and Partners Marseille's moment As European Capital of Culture, Marseille is shaking off its seedy image, says Vanessa Thorpe, with a year of extraordinary arts events and a series of breathtaking architectural projects * An art and shopping tour of Marseille * Le Corbusier's Cité Radieuse rooftop gym transformed into art space * Marseille * Share #publisher Books RSS feed Thrillers RSS feed Fiction RSS feed Culture RSS feed Travel RSS feed Marseille RSS feed France RSS feed Europe RSS feed Life and style RSS feed French food and drink RSS feed Turn autoplay off -- Travel * Marseille · * France · * Europe * France Marseille's 'ghetto lycée' won't give up despite the problems its pupils face Surrounded by poverty and violence, the teachers at Lycée Saint-Exupéry work to make it an oasis of learning -- Jump to comments (…) Marseille France apartments A question of class ⦠apartment blocks in Marseille. Photograph: Gerard Julien/Getty In 1957, when it was first built, the population was soaring so there was no time to lose thinking of new names: it was just known as the Lycée Nord. On the hills to the north of Marseille, tower blocks were popping up like mushrooms, as housing for industrial workers and their immigrant reinforcements. Subsequently renamed after the writer Saint-Exupéry, it is still the only school in the poorest quarter of the city preparing students aged 15 and older for the baccalauréat and a range of technical qualifications. The main building, which is 350 metres long, overlooks Port de l'Estaque. In 2008 a new wing â all glass and concrete â was added. The lycée backs on to grassland, dotted with maritime pines, where the students can stroll. Le Monde visited on a Thursday, almost at the end of the school year, coinciding with a party for the top year. Several young women were inflating balloons. "It's nice here," they exclaim, with the characteristic Marseille twang. The college seems like an oasis of tranquillity, surrounded by "problem" estates. Just up the road the tower blocks of Consolat-Mirabeau are the source of regular incursions into the car park, despite the fence. To the south Campagne-Lévêque is just recovering after a month's occupation by the police to stop various forms of trafficking. Despite the summer weather, the cicadas and the smell of rock roses, what is striking is the imprint of poverty and violence. For the past 20 years the area has been gripped by unemployment and its attendant woes: increasingly casual employment, single-parent families, pensioners living behind bolted doors, single women struggling to make ends meet. The past two years have made things even worse: "There are things we didn't see before, like the dustbins being picked over every day, organised prostitution and youth suicides," says Patricia Bonin, a member of the parent-teacher association. -- Close this popup Marseille's 'ghetto lycée' won't give up despite the problems its pupils face This article was published on the Guardian website at 14.01 BST on Tuesday 23 July 2013. #publisher World news RSS feed France RSS feed Europe RSS feed Drugs trade RSS feed Travel RSS feed Marseille RSS feed Dispatch RSS feed Turn autoplay off -- Previous | Next | Index Marseille's battle between culture and crime The city is spending millions on its stint as Europe's culture capital in 2013 â but it is also fighting murderous gang crime -- Jump to comments (…) Fish market in Marseille The fish market in the Old Port of Marseille Photograph: Alamy In the old port of Massalia, where the Greeks arrived 2,600 years ago, the yachts, fishing boats and pleasure craft bob in the dappled water, as nut-brown fishermen sell the morning catch. A few streets away, the chic restaurants are packed and the luxury goods shops are doing brisk business in monogrammed handbags and gold watches. In the neighbouring quartier, prostitutes and drug dealers duck and dive to avoid the police patrols. These are the two faces of modern Marseille: the cosmopolitan, cultured pearl of the Mediterranean on the one hand; Rio-sur-Mer, as certain papers have nicknamed it, a lawless badland full of gangsters who could hold their own in the most dangerous Brazilian favela, on the other. With the city preparing for its year in the international limelight as European culture capital in 2013, there is a battle for Marseille's soul that will determine its reputation and future. No one in Marseille denies it has a huge problem with crime. Drugs, gambling and prostitution â and, more recently, corruption â have dominated the city's mob scene for four decades. But like many here, Yves Moraine, a lawyer and president of the ruling centre-right UMP group on the council, is sick of hearing the city likened to crime-riddled Rio, the Camorra stronghold of Naples, or even Chicago, America's murder capital. "It is a caricature, and unfair stigmatisation," he says, his voice rising. "If I said everything was rosy in Marseille I would be lying. But insisting everything is black, that is a lie too. Yes, there is poverty and delinquency and corruption, but to say things are black, black, black is utterly false." Moraine believes the culture year is a chance for Marseille to put its troubled past behind it and drag itself into the 21st century. Foreigners and native French always muddled along in a city that was home to writers, poets and artists, including Auguste Renoir, Paul Cézanne and Raoul Dufy and, more recently, footballer Zinedine Zidane. The dark underside of this melting pot has always been, as it is now, a higher than average level of violence and crime, often rooted in widespread poverty and the seediness depicted in the 1970s Gene Hackman film The French Connection II. However, the bubbling undercurrent turned into a terrifying tsunami at the beginning of the year with what one police officer described as an outbreak of "ultra violence" leading to 20 drug-related assassinations in nine months. David Oliver Reverdy, of the Marseille branch of the Alliance police union, blames it on territorial disputes between drug barons and a proliferation of weapons, namely Kalashnikovs, the weapon of choice for the city's criminal class. He says the killers and their victims were mostly young dealers, often minors, who "were afraid of nothing" and showed "an astonishing lack of consideration for human life or scruples about their atrocious acts". The violence of the attacks created an atmosphere of fear in a city that, unlike Paris, has not shunted its immigrant underclass out into grim high-rise suburbs, but still boasts run-down estates where youth unemployment is reported to be as high as 40%, more than 20% live under the poverty line, and jobless youngsters have turned to drugs and crime. "Disputes that would once have been settled with a punch are now being resolved with a Kalashnikov," said Reverdy. Since September, when a new police chief arrived â the third in three years â Reverdy says the situation has calmed. The killings have almost stopped and street crime has fallen to a third of its previous rate â thanks, he says, to more police officers patrolling the city. Just down from Marseille's magnificent St Charles station, built in 1848, Sami, as he calls himself, is with a group of youngsters kicking their heels in the shadow of decrepit stone buildings hung with drying washing. He says that his parents are Moroccan and he was born in France. He claims to be 15 but looks younger. Shouldn't he be at school? He shrugs. "Why?" he says before loping off. Said, a youth worker, says young Marseillais find it more lucrative to peddle drugs than go to classes. "A lot of the youngsters we're working with live in poverty and haven't been to school for years. We try to help them, but it's hard to motivate them to work hard at their education when they can earn more money dealing and there's no jobs for them afterwards." -- The city authorities are investing â¬800m for the capital of culture year, building new museums and extensions to existing museums and galleries, plus an extra â¬90m on imaginative events. Jean-François Chougnet, director of the 2013 culture year organisers, said he hoped it would help Marseille to metamorphose. But Benoît Gilles, a reporter with La Marseillaise, a daily newspaper founded in 1943 by members of the communist resistance, said 2013 risked further excluding the already excluded. "Organising a free street event or a spectacle in a rundown area is not going to make people feel included. The situation in Marseille is complicated. It cannot be denied that delinquency and crime are high here, but building museums and organising cultural events is not going to be a magic wand that is waved and suddenly everything is fine." Back in the Old Port, Fanny Rose Arnay, 72, was enjoying the warm November day. A familiar figure around the local fish market, she can often be found in sequins and a feather boa, singing to passers-by and tourists. She summed up the paradox that is Marseille. "It's a strange place," she said. "On the one hand it's undisciplined and very dangerous, so dangerous that sometimes I am afraid to go out. On the other, it's colourful, interesting and extraordinary. Marseille...it's like nowhere else in the world." ⢠The following correction was published in the Observer on 4 December 2011: "A battle for the ancient port's divided soul" (Dispatch, Marseille) described Chicago as "the murder capital of America". According to FBI statistics from 2010, New Orleans tops the infamous league with a rate of 49.9 per 100,000. St Louis is second at 40.5. Chicago is down the list at 15.2. Daily Email close -- Close this popup Marseille's battle between culture and crime This article appeared on p2 of the Main section section of the Observer on Sunday 27 November 2011. It was published on the Guardian website at 00.04 GMT on Sunday 27 November 2011. It was last modified at 18.31 BST on Friday 28 June 2013. -- Travel * Marseille Series -- Travel * Marseille More news #publisher Travel RSS feed Marseille RSS feed Festivals RSS feed France RSS feed Europe RSS feed Art and design RSS feed Culture RSS feed Festivals RSS feed Museums RSS feed Music RSS feed French style special RSS feed Turn autoplay off -- * Travel * Marseille Series: French style special -- Previous | Next | Index The hottest French city of 2013: Marseille There's never been a better time to visit Marseille. It's this year's European Capital of Culture and a new Eurostar service makes it easier than ever to get there * Share * Tweet this -- * Jump to comments (…) l'Ombrière, Norman Foster's sleek, mirrored sunshade and events pavilion in Marseille's Vieux Port View larger picture l'Ombrière, Norman Foster's sleek, mirrored sunshade and events pavilion in Marseille's Vieux Port. Photograph: Boris Horvat/AFP This summer, Eurostar is running a Saturday service right across France to Aix-en-Provence. This is the farthest a direct train has ever travelled from London, covering 750 miles in just over six hours. -- So treat yourself to a pastis in a street-side cafe on the Cours Mirabeau. Tune in to the steady murmur of intellectual conversation or, better still, eavesdrop on the posturing and plans for youthful high jinks, the hallmarks of one of France's foremost university towns. Take advantage of the surprisingly vibrant nightlife. Tuck into the local aïoli, olive oil and speciality chocolates. Stroll out through the woods to the craggy slopes of Mont St Victoire, a favourite subject of Picasso as well as of Cézanne. You'll never want to leave â but this summer at least, you must. Aix has a decent share of exhibitions and shows in the Provence-wide celebration of Marseille's status as this year's European Capital of Culture, but the real action is in the port city, 30 minutes away by train. Like Liverpool, Marseille has used its Capital of Culture status to launch a massive push for regeneration; and here, too, it seems to be working. The old port can now hold its own against any world city. Once-crumbling blocks of apartments are suddenly spruce, beloved landmarks have been polished up, seedy waterfronts reclaimed. Tourists are already flocking around â and under â l'Ombrière, Norman Foster's sleek, mirrored sunshade and events pavilion in the Vieux Port. Meanwhile, the Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilisations, which opens next month, promises to be nothing short of spectacular. Of course, this being Marseille, a few questions have been asked about the â¬550m (£460m) that has been spent so far. The run-up to the festivities has generated some horrific stories of police corruption and gangland killings, while the construction work has thrown the city's already rather too exciting roads into yet more chaos. In other words (again like Liverpool), Marseille has retained its unique character throughout. This has always been one of the most invigorating, exciting and cosmopolitan cities in France. Add to that a packed programme of open-air concerts, exhibitions, artistic happenings and, intriguingly, a guided eyes-closed tour of the city, and even the 200mph Eurostar won't feel as if it's getting you there fast enough. Daily Email close -- Close this popup The hottest French city of 2013: Marseille This article appeared on p29 of the Weekend section of the Guardian on Saturday 25 May 2013. It was published on the Guardian website at 09.00 BST on Saturday 25 May 2013. It was last modified at 00.31 BST on Thursday 4 July 2013. It was first published at 09.01 BST on Saturday 25 May 2013. Travel * Marseille · * Festivals · * France · -- Travel * Marseille · * Festivals · * France · -- Readers’ tips * Marseille: Michelin Camping Guide France offers the very best and cheapest camping facilities in all of Europe. We know, we have been camping in Germany, Switzerland, Spain, Netherlands… Posted by grandthing 28 Apr 2013 * Marseille: Bar OM Football supporters' bar, but not as scary as that sounds! Friendly staff, good food, moderately priced drinks considering the position. We were made Posted by rosnapier 15 Mar 2013 * Marseille: Trying REAL bouillabaisse An authentic fish stew served with aioli - succulent pieces of fish served in a tasty broth with little pieces of crusty bread topped with a rich garlic… Posted by Jelee58 17 Apr 2012 * Marseille: A walk along the Calanques If you want to bask in the warm Mediterranean sea, but hate the crowds that fill much of Franceâs coastline, head to the vibrant, chilled out port of Posted by Ellabella3011 15 Apr 2012 -- * l'Ombrière, Norman Foster's sleek, mirrored sunshade and events pavilion in Marseille's Vieux Port Photograph: Boris Horvat/AFP * France Mediterranean civilisations museum feted as turning point for Marseille French city still notorious for gun crime and drug smuggling welcomes opening of Mucem -- * Email * Angelique Chrisafis in Marseille * * theguardian.com, Monday 3 June 2013 18.45 BST -- The Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilisations, by architect Rudy Ricciotti. Photograph: Patrick Aventurier/Getty Photograph: Patrick Aventurier/Getty Images At the mouth of Marseille's old port, against the blue of the Mediterranean sits a mysterious dark cube draped in a giant concrete net â an audacious new architectural emblem for a port city desperate to shake off its stereotypes as the French capital of Kalashnikovs, gang wars, drug-smuggling, political corruption and football mania. After more than a decade of delays and political wrangling, Tuesday will see the grand opening by François Hollande of Mucem, France's new Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilisations. The â¬191m project is the first museum in the world dedicated to Mediterranean civilisations and culture, and the first standalone French "national museum" ever to be located outside the centralised cultural grandeur of Paris. Mucem is not just the centrepiece of Marseille's 2013 stint as European capital of culture, which aims to attract 10 million visitors this year, despite the bad press over six gangland gun deaths and one fatal stabbing since January and various sleaze investigations including a popular local Socialist MP recently given a jail sentence for buying votes. Marseille won the capital of culture tag by arguing that the real cultural questions facing Europe today were "migration, racism, gender relations, religion, ecology". Mucem, which aims for 300,000 visitors a year, is a celebration of a cosmopolitan, ethnically mixed city, proud that its housing estates did not erupt in riots like the Paris suburbs in 2005. But although it doesn't have the ghettoes of Paris, it has more unemployment and poverty. For years, as the symbolic Mucem project snaked its way through the highest levels of the French state, from the Socialist government of 2000 that conceived it as a return of national culture to the provinces, via Nicolas Sarkozy, who saw it as a symbol of his ill-fated political "Mediterranean union", the question has been, what would actually be displayed inside. -- Central to the rebelliousness of the project was the building's provocative designer, Rudy Ricciotti, the enfant terrible of French architecture. Born in Algeria, the French architect said he carried the Mediterranean curse of perpetual travel, "a fracture which never heals". The museum is built on Marseille's disused pier, where migrants often had their first glimpse of the city, and a rooftop walkway links it to the 17th-century Fort Saint-Jean, open to the public for the first time. Ricciotti described his building full of dappled, fragmented light as a "vertical kasbah", an "architecture of resistance against imperialist mythology". He said it would restore calm to Marseille after the city had taken such a whipping in the national media in recent years. The architect said: "The whole world directs hatred at Marseille, it's like a kind of Quasimodo, it takes hit after hit and just smiles back, it doesn't understand the hatred so it just replies with an enigmatic stare. Culture is an element of peaceâmaking." Daily Email close -- Close this popup Mediterranean civilisations museum feted as turning point for Marseille This article was published on the Guardian website at 18.45 BST on Monday 3 June 2013. It was last modified at 00.00 BST on Tuesday 4 June 2013. * France Marseille gangland murders prompt French crisis talks Son of football boss becomes latest victim of violence in city with long history of organised crime -- Jump to comments (…) Adrien Anigo murder in Marseille Police at the scene of Adrien Anigo's murder in Marseille. Photograph: Guillaume Horcajuelo/EPA The French government will lead crisis talks on Saturday over a spate of gangland murders in Marseille, after the shooting of a football boss's son â the 15th gun death this year â sparked soul-searching over the Mediterranean city's inability to shed its image as the "Chicago of the south". Adrien Anigo, 30, whose father, José Anigo, is sporting director of Olympique de Marseille, was shot dead in broad daylight on Thursday by two men on a motorbike while he was driving a rented Renault Twingo. The father of two, who ran a brasserie, was well known to police. He had been under investigation over jewellery store armed robberies carried out by a local gang and had been due to appear in court in the near future. In the past he had served time in prison on remand before being released over a judicial error, French media reported. Anigo's father grew up on a poor estate before becoming a player at Marseille, one of France's oldest and most popular clubs, and then sporting director. Anigo Sr, an imposing figure, has always denied having any mafia or crime links of his own. Two years ago, asked by the Journal du Dimanche about his son, he said: "The street sucked in my son, but that's got nothing to do with anyone but the justice system." Hours before Anigo was killed, a 24-year-old man was gunned down at La Ciotat just outside Marseille after masked men on motorbikes tracked him arriving at his place of work. The government is under pressure to act on the violent crime that has blighted Marseille as it tries to shed its old image as a city of gangs, drug deals, corruption and political clientelism. The ongoing problems have cast a shadow over Marseille's stint as European capital of culture this year. While tourist numbers have risen sharply in the past six months, with the city aiming to attract 10 million visitors this year and the new Museum of the Mediterranean hailed as an architectural masterpiece, French headlines have been dominated by gang murders. This year's death toll has not yet matched 2012's exceptionally high total of 24 gang killings in the Bouches-du-Rhone area including Marseille, but the methods have alarmed authorities. Increasingly, AK47s â reportedly available for â¬500 each â are being used to settle scores. Execution-style killings, once described by the state prosecutor as Marseille's "regrettable speciality", persist. The interior minister, Manuel Valls, has ordered together all political parties, saying: "I understand the anger of the Marseille people but we need time [to act] against drug-trafficking and daily delinquency." He called a truce on the left-right political slanging matches over who was to blame. The rightwing mayor of Marseille, Jean-Claude Gaudin, has denounced France's "Marseille-bashing". Last month the state sent 130 extra riot police and 24 investigators to Marseille. but many observers say the problem runs deeper. Although Marseille has recovered from the 1990s horror years of industrial decline, unemployment remains above the national average and more than 20% of residents live below the poverty line. Some estates have more than 40% youth unemployment, and young people have few prospects but the "underground economy" of drug deals. Marie-Arlette Carlotti, a government minister competing in the Socialist primary race to choose a Marseille mayoral candidate next year, said the "real mafia networks" must be neutralised. "We have to find out where the money is, the white collars, because there are bosses in all this, even if the mafia is less well-organised than it was in the past. We have to look at exterior signs of wealth, trace the networks to their bank accounts in protected places." Marseille had hoped to move on from its long history of organised crime and murderous mobsters with names such as The Belgian, The Blond or The Tomcat. After the second world war, Marseille gangs known as the "French Connection" ran vast illegal laboratories processing heroin coming in from Turkey and the east. By the late 60s, about 80% of heroin in the US was trafficked from Marseille. In 1971, the figure of the Marseille drug baron was immortalised in the Hollywood film the French Connection. Marseille is no longer a heroin or drug-processing capital, but it remains at the centre of the trade in cannabis coming into Europe through Spain from Morocco. The city is also a key point in the cocaine smuggling route into Europe from South America through west Africa. But local dealing on poor housing estates is now at the centre of its problems. Mothers complain that young men are falling victim to increasingly violent attacks over petty fallings-out or small debts. Daily Email close -- Close this popup Marseille gangland murders prompt French crisis talks This article was published on the Guardian website at 17.34 BST on Friday 6 September 2013. It was last modified at 00.07 BST on Saturday 7 September 2013. * France All over for Tomcat and Gremlin as new breed of gangster takes hold in Marseille Port city back in headlines amid huge rise in feud killings and armed robberies -- * Email * Angelique Chrisafis in Marseille * * The Guardian, Friday 13 February 2009 -- Jacky 'Le Mat' Imbert, 79, has managed to avoid convictions for serious offences despite being one of the most notorious godfathers in the French criminal underworld. Photograph: Anne-Christine Poujoulat/AFP On a narrow street behind Marseille's old port, where hostess bars nudge up against sandwich shops, Christine Imbert was redecorating her beauty salon, Starlet's. Business isn't easy when you're known as Marseille's foremost gangster's moll. "People judge you for your name," sighed the 38-year-old, proud to be the fourth wife of Jacky "Le Mat" Imbert, 79, one of the most notorious godfathers of the French criminal underworld. -- Mrs Imbert has branched out from her routine waxing and sunbeds with a fashion line of T-shirts, jeans, snakeskin trousers and leather fedoras. Each carries the logo of a cat - the exact scribbled feline drawing her husband used to sign his name on his letters from prison. Known as the Madman or the cat with nine lives, Jacky Imbert was once shot 23 times by hitmen but escaped. Despite the mix of drugs, gambling and prostitution that has dominated the Marseille mob scene for four decades, Imbert has sidestepped any serious convictions, serving only short prison terms. "The cops always came to ask me about the jobs I didn't do. For the ones I did do, I never saw anyone," he once said. He has no bodyguards and drinks in bars with his back to the door. Who would kill a man who came back from the dead? "My husband is a true gentleman," said Mrs Imbert, admiring the framed pictures of Jacky with his friend, the actor Alain Delon. Her designer hooded sweatshirts bearing the prison number of the "Legend of Marseille" is a way of honouring him. She feels that modern-day Marseille criminals are out of control and have lost all sense of respect. In Marseille's long history of organised crime, where murderous mobsters with names such as The Belgian and The Blond became folklore, it's perhaps not surprising that the underworld spawned its own spin-off clothing line. But France's second city is now battling a new wave of murderous, organised crime gangs. The Mediterranean port city, designated European capital of culture for 2013, has for years worked to shed its gangland image as "Chicago of the south" and rebrand itself as a major city break destination. President Nicolas Sarkozy is pouring money into two new museums and wants the city to be the centre of his Mediterranean Union. Cosmopolitan Marseille is fiercely proud that its housing estates did not erupt in the violent rioting of the Paris suburbs in 2005. Many felt it was because youth are fiercely proud of their Marseillais identity in a city that is not split into the ghettoes of racism of the Paris outskirts. But despite Marseille's ongoing transformation, its poor are struggling to stay afloat and gun-toting criminals are back in the headlines. Three young men were shot dead in a car waiting at traffic lights in northern Marseille two weeks ago. It was the biggest single death toll of a series of murders over drug feuds and turf wars. "Marseille has always had organised crime, but in the past month we've seen an acceleration, a much greater density of attacks and murders," said Jacques Dallest, the state prosecutor. He listed 70 gun attacks this year. The number of armed hold-ups of boulangeries, small grocers and tobacconists in Marseille is rising so fast that the government has stepped in with special measures. Across France, from Grenoble to Ajaccio, the number of feud murders by hitmen rose from 58 in 2007 to more than 120 last year. But Dallest said criminal execution-style killings remained Marseille's "regrettable speciality". On Tuesday night , "La Brise de Mer", the Corsican gang that has dominated the Marseille crime scene, saw one of its biggest godfathers murdered by a sniper. He was the second major godfather killed in Corsica in less than a month. On Marseille's northern housing estates, social workers say poverty has worsened the problem. More than 20% of the city's population live below the poverty line. Although Marseille has recovered from the 1990s horror years of industrial decline and acute unemployment, joblessness still exceeds the national average. Local politicians warn that some estates have more than 40% youth unemployment and there is an "underground economy" of drug deals and turf wars. When Fadéla Amara, the minister responsible for overhauling France's estates, visited Marseille's high rises last week, she was assailed by residents complaining about run-down housing and the lack of hope for the young. "Where there is poverty and no prospects for young people, crime seems like an option, a way to climb the social ladder, and Marseille has always been a good university of crime," said the Marseille thriller writer Xavier-Marie Bonnot, who has made several films about the city's underworld. Drugs have long been central to gang crime in a city that boasts the biggest port in the western Mediterranean. After the second world war, Marseille gangs known as the "French Connection" ran vast illegal laboratories processing heroin coming in from Turkey and the east. By the late 60s, about 80% of heroin in the US was trafficked from Marseille. In 1971, the figure of the Marseille drug baron was immortalised in the Hollywood film the French Connection, and for a decade, the city's criminal gangs killed each other in vicious feuding. A drug trafficking trial last month showed that although Marseille is no longer a heroin or drug processing capital, it remains at the centre of the trade in cannabis coming into Europe through Spain from Morocco. The city is also a key point in the cocaine smuggling route into Europe from South America through west Africa. Local police have warned that members of the new generation of criminals are ready to use automatic weapons over the slightest drug trafficking rivalry. In her salon, Mrs Imbert sighed: "Back then, in the 1970s, there was respect. Now people here seem to kill for nothing." -- Jacques Imbert, 79, alias Jacky Le Mat, the Tomcat or Madman Former champion trotting driver, aviator and nightclub supremo suspected by police of being a contract killer in the 1960s before becoming a key figure in Marseille's underworld in the 1970s. He was jailed in 2004 for a contraband cigarette scam involving the Russian mafia, but was later cleared on appeal. Describes himself as "retired". Francis Vanverberghe, alias the Belgian Notorious in the bloody battle for control of Marseille's "French connection" drug imports. Gunned down outside a betting shop on the Champs Elysée in Paris in 2000, near a bar where he was suspected of pimping, leaving behind a network bent on revenge. Farid Berrhama, alias the Gremlin, Grey or the Roaster A Marseille drugs kingpin suspected of at least a dozen gangland murders. He was shot down alongside a suspected henchman when a dozen armed men opened fire in a Marseille restaurant in 2006. Christian Oraison, alias the Big Blond -- Close this popup A new breed of gangster takes hold in Marseille This article appeared on p27 of the Main section section of the Guardian on Friday 13 February 2009. It was published on the Guardian website at 00.01 GMT on Friday 13 February 2009. It was last modified at 00.06 GMT on Friday 13 February 2009. It was first published at 00.05 GMT on Friday 13 February 2009. * France French government under pressure over Marseille gun deaths Marseille senator and mayor calls for army to deal with drug gangs after 19th gun-related death in the region this year * Share * Tweet this -- French Interior Minister Manuel Valls French interior minister Manuel Valls tells the press it is out of question to deploy soldiers in Marseille after the latest gun-related death in the city. Photograph: Patrick Kovarik/AFP/Getty Images The French government is under growing pressure to contain Marseille's deadly drug wars after the 19th gun-related death in the region this year. The latest casualty prompted a Socialist senator to call for the army to be sent in to control estates in the city. As Marseille prepares to become European capital of culture next year, the growing problem of drug dealers setting scores with AK-47s has blighted its public relations drive. On Wednesday, a 25-year-old known to police over drug-trafficking, was hit with Kalashnikov-fire as he travelled in the passenger seat of a Renault Twingo in the north of the city. It was the 14th gun-related death connected to drug gangs in Marseille since the start of this year, the 19th in the region. A few weeks earlier another 25-year-old who had recently been released from prison died in hospital after he was shot in the south of the city. This year's Marseille gang deaths already exceed the figures for the whole of 2011. The Socialist senator and mayor of two Marseille districts, Samia Ghali, warned: "It's now useless sending a coach of riot police to stop the dealers. When one is stopped, 10 more take up the flame. It's like fighting an ants' nest." She said faced with the heavy weapons used by the gangs, "only the army can intervene". Her comments embarrassed the Socialist government, which is already under pressure over how to handle security on France's most restive estates. Manuel Valls, the interior minister, dismissed Ghali's comments: "Its out of the question for the army to respond to these dramas and crimes." He said there was no "enemy within" against whom the French army would go to war on its own territory. -- Close this popup French government under pressure over Marseille gun deaths This article was published on the Guardian website at 18.33 BST on Thursday 30 August 2012. It was last modified at 20.30 BST on Tuesday 2 July 2013. * France Crime-weary Marseille calls for Batman's help Tongue-in-cheek plea for a superhero's help after politicians suggest army should tackle drug gangs -- Jump to comments (…) An armed French policeman on duty in Marseille. An armed French policeman on duty in Marseille. Photograph: Boris Horvat/AFP To the Greek sailors who landed at MassalÃa 600 years before Christ, it was a haven of trading and culture, known for the wisdom of its lawmakers and ability to successfully repel looting and pillaging barbarians. Today a similar struggle is being waged for the soul of France's second-largest city. While enjoying its status as the European capital of culture, Marseille is waging a war against modern barbarians: drug gangs. The city still has a way to go to rival neighbouring Corsica, and even the French overseas department of Guiana, as crime capital of France, but the 15 gangland killings in Marseille since the beginning of 2013 have created an atmosphere of rampant lawlessness in the Mediterranean port. And since la bonne mère atop the church of Notre Dame de la Garde, the huge golden figure that dominates the city skyline, is clearly not doing her job as guardian and protector, frustrated local people are calling for "a Batman to save Marseille". The group of young Marseillais evoking the caped crusader has collected hundreds of signatures for a petition mocking the apparent impotence of both local and national authorities to tackle crime in the city. -- Jean-Baptiste Jaussaud, a founder member, says calling on Batman is no more ridiculous than recent calls for the army to occupy housing estates or for military drones to be used to keep tabs on drug dealers. "It's as if the politicians are trying to outdo each other with bigger and better proposals, none of them any more credible than expecting Batman to swoop down and solve the city's problems in a day," Jaussaud said. "We have to stop the stigmatisation of Marseille. Of course the murders are worrying and the city has a crime problem, but it's not going to be solved by more and more outrageous press statements." Part of the Batman campaign is to combat what the collective sees as the bad press Marseille is getting. "Crime in Marseille is not significantly worse than anywhere else in France," Jaussaud said. "Nor are we all gangsters walking around with Kalashnikovs, which is the impression being given." However, the group's aims are vague: urging local residents to "take crime in hand", make people "more responsible" and "act against incivility". In the 1960s and early 70s, Marseille was the hub of the wa well-organised drug network controlled by Corsicans, through which heroin was smuggled from Turkey to France and on to the US. Today most of the dealing is in hashish and cocaine, and done by smaller, more disparate groups of youngsters in the rundown northern city suburbs, home to the large community of immigrants of north African origin, where unemployment is high. The Collectif des Quartiers Populaires de Marseille et Environs (association for the working-class areas of Marseille and around) says inequality and discrimination have created a climate of violence in the housing estates. "We are opposed to all forms of violence ⦠but we cannot ignore the causes of this violence. We have to take into account the numerous frustrations, discriminations, relegations and exclusions that the citizens of these working-class areas endure as part of their daily existence," it said. David-Olivier Reverdy, of the Marseille police union Alliance, told the Observer that, if François Hollande's government had money to spend on sending in the military or buying expensive drones, it would be better spent on more local police. "We've had enough of Marseille being compared to Kabul or Damascus. This kind of talk is exaggerated. Rather than employ military methods, we would be better off having permanent police on the ground," Reverdy said. "Our officers are becoming demotivated because while talking tough and firm, the government is not acting tough and firm. We need firm acts, not just firm words. We were told that crime and security in Marseille was a priority and we would be given the means to combat them, but this hasn't happened." Marseille has undergone a renaissance as part of its designation as Europe's culture capital, with a £552m programme that has seen refurbished docks, new and renovated museums and public buildings, and a busy arts programme. It is the city's crime woes, however, that have grabbed the national headlines and added grist to the far-right Front National mill. The FN has profited from squabbling between the nationally ruling Socialists and the opposition UMP party, which controls Marseille city hall, and their failure to end the violence, gaining support in the runup to next year's municipal elections. The FN leader, Marine Le Pen, told supporters in the city this month: "Marseille is not the exception â it's the shape of things to come. The gangrene of crime is spreading through France." The deleterious atmosphere was exacerbated on Friday when the regional Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur authority's accounts department released a scathing report on the running of Marseille. It criticised the city's mounting debt, currently at £1.5bn and expected to rise by £86m in 2014, and the working hours of public employees, found to be below the national average. Jaussaud said that, apart from trying to address the crime problem and the unfair stigmatisation of Marseille, the Batman campaign aimed to wrest back a sense of local pride. "We have this wonderful culture, we have dynamic businesses, we have magnificent public buildings, but all anyone wants to talk about is crime," he said. "This is the paradox of Marseille." Daily Email close -- Close this popup Crime-weary Marseille calls for Batman's help This article appeared on p30 of the Main section section of the Observer on Sunday 29 September 2013. It was published on the Guardian website at 00.05 BST on Sunday 29 September 2013. It was last modified at 00.11 BST on Sunday 29 September 2013. #publisher Art and design RSS feed Le Corbusier RSS feed Design RSS feed Art RSS feed Travel RSS feed Marseille RSS feed World news RSS feed France RSS feed Culture RSS feed Heritage RSS feed Architecture and design blog RSS feed Turn autoplay off -- Le Corbusier's Cité Radieuse rooftop gym transformed into art space French designer Ora-Ãto is converting the famous Marseille roof terrace into a haven for contemporary art * Share * Tweet this -- rooftop of Le Corbusier's Cité Radieuse Park in the sky ⦠the rooftop of Le Corbusier's Cité Radieuse in Marseille. Photograph: Mamo "Welcome to my place," says Ito Morabito, perched on the balustrade of the most famous rooftop of any 20th-century building. Behind the young French designer, concrete forms gleam in the midday Marseille sun: a great ventilation stack flares out like a sculptural vase; a paddling pool nestles beneath a classroom on stilts; children clamber on a mock-mountain of rugged rocks. The roof terrace of Le Corbusier's Cité Radieuse apartment building, completed in 1953, has long been the symbol of the sun-drenched ideal of Mediterranean modernism â a park in the sky for the residents of this brave new vertical city. It stretches out like the deck of an ocean liner, with rocky mountain peaks to one side, the open sea to the other, a landscape of collective leisure suspended 18 storeys up in the air. And now it has a new owner, with big ambitions. "This will be the reason people come to Marseille," says Morabito, who has never been one to shy away from big claims. Now 35, he was catapulted to fame 10 years ago when he designed a series of fake products for luxury brands, complete with fake advertising campaigns, under the pseudonym Ora-Ãto. These fraudulent objects, and the audacity with which he promoted them, created so much hype the very brands he was pirating began to beat a path to his door with real commissions. His design skills have since proved a little less successful than his capacity as a PR stuntman, but that has not hindered his plan to transform this little piece of Corbusian heritage into an international art centre. It is a story as unlikely as his own rise to fame. So how did it come about? Beneath the roof terrace, the cliff-like stack of apartments of the Cité Radieuse is peppered with shops and offices, a hotel and restaurant, doctor's surgery and nursery school. In Corb's vision, the building's 1,600 residents would shop, eat and learn together â while up on the roof they would exercise as one in a purpose-built gym, paid for by the residents' association. Only, like a lot of gyms, most people that paid for it didn't actually use it. As residents grew tired of contributing to its upkeep, the gym was privatised, and when the owner retired three years ago, he put it up for sale. Ora-Ito on the roof Ora-Ãto surveys his new kingdom. Photograph: Mamo "As soon as I heard it was on the market, I jumped on a train," says Morabito, who was born in Marseille, the son of jeweller Pascal Morabito, but now runs his studio from Paris. "I grew up knowing this building, so I couldn't resist that chance to own such an important piece of it." While many others had the same idea, he says his bid was favoured by the building's co-owners because he was one of the few who proposed restoring the rooftop back to its original state. It had become rundown and poorly maintained, its abandoned spaces a site of illicit trysts. "It was the fucking place," he grins. -- Lengthy negotiations, with the help of the Fondation Le Corbusier, have allowed him to slice off the wart. This revealed an expansive sun deck complete with a shower room studded with coloured tiles, and the Fondation supplied original drawings to enable restoration of the structure â including a set of beautiful timber sliding doors, designed by Corb's collaborator Charlotte Perriand. At a cost of â¬7m â jointly funded by Ora-Ãto, the building's co-owners and the French state â the entire rooftop has been immaculately restored, while work is underway to transform the former gym into an arts space, cafe and artists' residences, which will host a site-specific installation for four months over the summer each year. The project is christened Mamo â the "Marseille Modulor" â in a riff on Le Corbusier's system of measurement, and a cheeky inversion of New York's MoMA, which seems appropriate given how Ora-Ãto made his name. "I want it to be like a boxing match between Le Corbusier and the artist," says Morabito, who has lined up French sculptor Xavier Veilhan to be first in the ring with one of his Architectones installations â a series of works developed for specific architectural sites around the world. During the winter months, the space will host lectures and workshops with architecture schools. Set to open in June as part of Marseille's 2013 Capital of Culture extravaganza, only time will tell whether the residents of the Cité Radieuse will find a contemporary arts space more useful than a gym, or whether it is another step in the promotion of the Ora-Ãto brand. Either way, it has spurred on an overdue restoration, and it is a valuable addition to the city's emerging network of arts venues. As Morabito smiles, taking in the view of his new domain: "We will make a big noise when it opens. We are a very big â how do you say â show-off." Daily Email close -- Travel * Marseille World news -- Travel * Marseille World news -- More blogposts * More on Marseille * A shiny shade structure for Marseille by Foster and Partners Marseille's moment As European Capital of Culture, Marseille is shaking off its seedy image, says Vanessa Thorpe, with a year of extraordinary arts events and a series of breathtaking architectural projects * Marseille's £6bn Capital of Culture rebirth * An art and shopping tour of Marseille * Marseille Art Under Attack: Win tickets to a private viewing at Tate Britain * France Marseille's Cité Radieuse damaged by fire Authorities assess damage to architect Le Corbusier's Radiant City, a landmark of modernist architecture -- FRANCE-FIRE-CORBUSIER-HERITAGE Frefighters tackle a blaze in three flats at Le Corbusier's Cité Radieuse in Marseille. Photograph: Bruno Planchais/AFP/Getty Images One of France's most important landmarks of modernist architecture, La Cité Radieuse housing estate in Marseille, built by the architect Le Corbusier, has been damaged by fire. Fire services fought for over 12 hours to put out a blaze that began on Thursday afternoon in a first floor flat in the nine-storey concrete complex which is protected by special heritage status in France. -- Close this popup Marseille's Cité Radieuse damaged by fire This article was published on the Guardian website at 10.41 GMT on Friday 10 February 2012. It was last modified at 20.30 BST on Saturday 29 June 2013. Nearby was something impressive, the La Coste wine estate where Irish entrepreneur Paddy âClaridgeâsâ McKillen has created a hugely ambitious sculpture park. By the time it is finished, with the golf course and hotel, it will be a World of Adventures with vines. So we went on to Marseille, the 2013 European Capital of Culture, to see the new MuCEM (the politically correct and wearyingly inclusive Museum of the Civilisation of Europe and the Mediterranean), perhaps Franceâs very last grand projet. Local architect Rudy Ricciotti says he wants to âdemuseumify museumsâ. Not, if you ask me, a felicitous expression that promises calm and clarity. Still, if you want to find an architectural demonstration of what France has become, visit the Fort Saint-Jean complex on the Vieux-Port. I kept on trying to translate âmink coat and no knickersâ as we sweated and jostled through vapid exhibits at MuCEM, trivialised by big swinging architectural rhetoric. And if âcultureâ means vast queues of listless tourists gazing at plasma screens, personally I want none of it. At least there were no troubadours. -- We stayed in Le Corbusierâs Cité Radieuse which has a number of apartments available for brief stays. I am no doctrinaire opponent of strict-observance Modernism, far from it, but here was another test of French dream vs French reality. The cheerful âvertical garden cityâ of the propaganda has a haunted and sinister quality. Not sinister in the sense that a demandeur dâemploi troubadour might knife you in a dark corridor, but more that it is solid with a sense of failure. It strikes me as significant that the Toulouse riots of 2005 began in a banlieue designed by pupils of Le Corbusier. Fact: they donât have riots in Le Panier, the crumbly dense old quarter of Marseille. I reflected on this as we left the city to meet friends for lunch in Peter Mayle country near Ménerbes. Marseille is a difficult place not, I think, at ease with itself. Sweaty and desolate in turns, sullen and grumbly, despite the City of Culture wash ânâ brush-up. Then we hit the D99 between Saint-Rémy and Cavaillon with its lovely arbres and the dream came rushing back. Suggested Topics * Styles And Clothes * Marseille * Architects * France Arts + Ents > Art > Features European Capital of Culture: A capital experience in Marseille [marseille-getty.jpg] [marseille-getty.jpg] Cultural calendar steams ahead after innumerable delays -- Email After a sluggish start and innumerable delays, Marseille's year as European Capital of Culture is steaming ahead. The year was nearly halfway over before some of the flagship projects finally opened. Two of the biggest happen to be neighbours on the revamped Joliette docks near the city's neo-Byzantine Cathédrale de la Major. These two enormous blocks of glass and concrete â one black, one white â have turned their backs on the city to focus on the sea. Smoky glass covered with charcoal concrete latticework make up the Musée des Civilisations de l'Europe et de la Méditerranée (MuCEM), the first national museum outside Paris. Permanent exhibitions showcase the history of the peoples of the Mediterranean â fittingly so, as most of these races have been absorbed into Marseille's multi-ethnic population over the centuries since the city was founded 2,500 years ago. Even its architect, Rudy Ricciotti, personifies the mish-mash that is Marseille: he's French, of Italian origin and born in Algeria. The latticework covering parts of the building screens a walkway around the perimeter that is open to the public. A stroke of genius was to connect this walkway to a bridge linking the ultramodern MuCEM to the 17th-century Fort St-Jean on the hilltop behind it. -- In MuCEM's more audacious neighbour, Villa Méditerranée, Italian architect Stefano Boeri has created a giant chunky letter C, with the lower curve submerged under a newly created moat and the upper curve a 40m-long cantilever jutting towards the sea. Glass-bottomed patches of floor-space in the overhanging level give glimpses of the pool of water beneath. The panoramic viewpoint and permanent exhibitions are free, but the very French nature of the cultural events scheduled (debates, documentaries, concerts) could make it less inclusive for those without a decent grasp of the language. Even with delays and ubiquitous construction cranes, Marseille could end up doing a London Olympics and surpassing everyone's expectations. That's already evident in the Vieux Port, where traffic has been tamed and the waterfront teems with people rediscovering their own city. Norman Foster's Ombrière, a giant, flat, mirrored sunshade (pictured) 6m above the ground at the water's edge, instantly captivates as people can't help but stare up and marvel at a world turned upside down. Which is exactly what the city of Marseille needed. www.mp2013.fr Suggested Topics * Marseille * Architects * France off the coast of Marseille because militants will not let them dock Nearly 10,000 tons of rubbish has piled up in Marseille and its possible," said Frederic Chabert, 47, at Fos-sur-Mer, a Marseille area up in Marseille, the nation's second-largest city. Marseille, covered in garbage, I think then the situation could change dockers at France's biggest oil port, at Marseille. Twin brothers arrested for six rapes in Marseille to have their DNA tested in Marseille last year. Marseille police chief Emmanual Kiehl said: `It is a highly unusual here in Marseille. in Marseille, France last year (file picture) in Marseille, France last year (file picture) Police in Marseille are also holding two 21-year-old Corsican twins Marvellous Marseille - an unexpectedly inviting port of call But the rugged, vibrant city of Marseille makes a great holiday For years, Marseille has been the poor neighbour of the south, far Marseille is compact and built on a hill, so it is easy to orientate traditional Marseille fishing vessels. Marseille's limestone coastline Rugged: Marseille's limestone coastline enhances the beautiful blue of North of Vieux Port is Le Panier, the oldest part of Marseille. Up Marseille is very much a working port, and the beautiful basilica of Many tour operators run boat trips from Marseille and Cassis, and they Corniche, the coastal strip running southwest out of Marseille. We far from the sea in Marseille. One-way flights to Marseille start from under £50 and carriers Eurostar right to Marseille, stopping once en route. One-way prices French government crisis talks after Marseille football club director's son * Adrien Anigo, son of Olympique Marseille boss Jose Anigo, gunned * Marseille's mayor and officials call for end to in-fighting to 24 investigators to crack down on Marseille drug trade Marseille has become the focus of emergency French government talks Olympique Marseille - was the second person in a day to be killed in riot police and 24 investigators to Marseille, which has France's Marseille's 'regrettable speciality' - are becoming increasingly Gunned down: The 30-year-old son of Olympique Marseille's sporting Gunned down: The 30-year-old son of Olympique Marseille's sporting for work in the town of La Ciotat, some 20 miles from Marseille. clubs, grew up on a poor estate before becoming a player at Marseille. Popular: Olympique Marseille, with players such as Andre Pierre Popular: Olympique Marseille, with players such as Andre Pierre outside Marseille outside Marseille Tourist numbers have risen sharply in Marseille in the past six in the Bouches-du-Rhone area including Marseille. than 20 per cent of Marseille residents below the poverty line and Marseille's right-wing major Jean-Claude Gaudin has accused politicians in France of 'Marseille-bashing'. He said: 'I understand the anger of the Marseille people but we need Socialist primary race to choose a Marseille mayoral candidate next Marseille's drug trade became famous in the 1971 Hollywood film The trafficked from Marseille. Marseille has a population of about 1,500,000. I bet Nottingham has population of Marseille. Shootings happen in every major city. To label Marseille as crime-ridden is unfair. Dont let this put you off visiting Marseille....best Bouillabaise in Port in French city of Marseille evacuated as officials move a one-ton An area around the port of the French city of Marseille was evacuated Marseille (pictured) were told to leave while the bomb was removed Marseille (pictured) were told to leave while the bomb was removed Sacre feu! Marseille skyline lit up by fiery displays as it celebrates The skyline above the ancient city of Marseille burst into flame The display was part of Marseille's cultural celebrations as it is the The French city of Marseille is lit up by fire displays as it The French city of Marseille is lit up by fire displays as it The event was put on as part of the Marseille-Provence 2013 cultural The event was put on as part of the Marseille-Provence 2013 cultural Marseille is France's second-largest city after Paris and is thought Marseille's streets Marseille's streets Marseille, in the south of France, came alive with light during the Marseille, in the south of France, came alive with light during the Jean-Francois Chougnet, director general of Marseille Provence 2013, Marseille is twinned with the Slovakian city of Kosice as European Marseille and Kosice in Slovakia are the 2013 European Capitals of Marseille and Kosice in Slovakia are the 2013 European Capitals of Our experience of Marseille: Dreadful smell of sewerage in a square Marseille was founded by Ancient Greeks. Also there is no point going Ashford, Marseille, 6 months ago Have lived in and around Marseille for 29 years. It has good & bad I got mugged in marseille. News > World > Europe Marseille: Europe's most dangerous place to be young [Pg-28-marseille-afp.jpg] [Pg-28-marseille-afp.jpg] Away from its glamorous tourist centre, 15 men have died this year as the city's drug war spirals out of control. John Lichfield reports -- Email To understand Marseille catch a bus â bus number 30 from the Bougainville metro station. The route starts at the northern terminus of the metro system, five kilometres from the city centre. It winds past motorways, factories, unofficial rubbish tips and a 10th-century monastery. France's second city sprawls for another 10 kilometres over ridge after ridge of limestone hills. Each is crowned by a white citadel gleaming in the Mediterranean sunshine which, as the bus approaches, turns into a group of shabby tower blocks. -- Up to the 1960s, these were the scrubland and the hard-scrabble villages of the Marcel Pagnol novels set in the early part of the century. Fragments of the Provençal villages can still be seen. The "garrigue", or scrub, survives on the jagged mountains which crowd in from the east. But Marius, Jean de Florette and Manon des Sources and their descendants have long gone. My fellow passengers on the 45-minute ride to La Savine, one of the northernmost estates, are a blend of North Africans, Africans, Asians and Roma. The bus passes through the poorest districts of the poorest city in France. Almost 40 per cent of people who live here are below the poverty line, compared to 26 per cent in Marseille as a whole and 15 per cent nationally. In the richer, mostly white, areas south of the city centre, the risk of dying before the age of 65 is 23 per cent below the national average. In north Marseille, it is 30 per cent higher than the French average. If you are a teenage boy or young man from northern Marseille, you risk dying long before the age of 65. Fifteen young men, mostly from the city's northern districts, have been shot dead this year as part of a war for the lucrative franchise to sell drugs â mostly cannabis and cocaine â to the people from the wealthier parts of the city and the suburbs. In fact, there have been almost as many killings of young men in the first nine months of 2012 as in the whole of last year. Proportionally, Marseille (population 800,000), now has almost as many drug-related murders as New York (population 8,000,000). Eyeing the issues, the French government has announced emergency action this month to stop the city, which will be the "European capital of culture" from January, from claiming title of the European capital of youth murder. At the end of the bus ride to La Savine, I met Rachida Tir, leader of the estate's resident's association. "For seven years now we have been losing our young men," she said. "This is not just about drug trafficking. That alone cannot explain the killing." -- "There is a suicidal instinct, a desperation in some of these boys. It starts with failure and rejection at school and the lack of jobs. They see no future. They live for the present, in a world of easy money and, now, violence." Earlier this month, Samia Ghali, the mayor of the 15th and 16th arrondissements of Marseille, which embrace most of the poor northern districts, detonated a verbal bombshell. She said that the drug-related violence in northern Marseille had become so extreme that only the army could defeat it. She called on the government to deploy troops to confiscate the cheap automatic weapons flowing in from the Balkans and North Africa and to interrupt a drug trade which is, she says, conducted with impunity. Ms Ghali, a child of northern Marseilles like Zinedine Zidane and Eric Cantona, admits that her proposal was mostly a "cry of alarm". "I was born and grew up here. I know what I'm talking about," she said. "I can no longer stomach seeing children that I have known since they were born drilled with holes. I cannot forget the distress of the girlfriend of [a recent victim] who found him shot 30 times. It is time to stop the massacre." Ms Ghali, a Socialist, berates the attitude of some politicians and commentators â including the centre-right mayor of Marseille Jean-Claude Gaudin - who dismiss the murders as "règlements de compte" ("tit-for-tat killings" or "a turf war"). "By using that kind of language, you're saying that these murders â and murder is the right word â are separate from polite society or the law," she said. "You are saying, 'let them kill each other'." Back in the busy, friendly centre of Marseille â a different planet from Bougainville and La Savine â I met Laurent Gaudon, a lawyer who has represented families of the victims. He also disputes the phrase "turf war". "Often it is not clear why these kids are dying," he said. "In one case I had last year a boy of 17 was shot because he had been disrespectful to another young man. The killer wanted to prove that he was tough enough to be in a drug gang." Marseille has always had gangland killings, Mr Gaudon said. "This is the city of the French Connection. All the organised crime of the Mediterranean basin passes through here â Corsicans, Sicilians." In the late 1990's the police dismantled the biggest of the old crime gangs. Since then the kids in the poorer estates have gradually taken over the local drugs trade. "The old gangsters had a code of honour but not the new ones," Mr Gaudon said. "The kids can buy guns for next to nothing and they use them for next to nothing." Ms Ghali's call for military intervention was dismissed as absurd by local and national politicians of Left and Right. It was, all the same, hugely successful. Within days, the government had drawn up an action plan to "rescue Marseille". The interior minister, Manuel Valls, and justice minister, Christiane Taubira, were in the city last week to set up a new "priority security zone" in the northern districts. There are to be 230 extra police officers and â for the first time in any French city other than Paris â a proper city police chief or "Prefect de Police". The Prime Minister, Jean-Marc Ayrault, has also promised the city the political and economic weight it needs to become a thriving "mediterranean metropolis". The population within the city boundary is relatively poor. Many richer people â the great grand-children of Jean de Florette and Manon des Sources â have moved out to the suburbs. This is the reverse of the usual French pattern where the cities are well-heeled and the inner suburbs poor and troubled. Mr Ayrault this week appointed another Prefect with the Herculean brief to dissolve local political jealousies and create a single, political and economic agglomeration, reconnecting Marseille with its rich satellite towns. He might begin by trying to dissolve the boundary between first and third worlds which begins at Bougainville metro station. "We have been abandoned. Forgotten," said Rachida Tir. "Most people here want to live decent, legal lives. But what choices do they have?" A local mayor said that the drug-related violence was so extreme only the army could defeat it -- Drug war in numbers 26: Percentage of people in Marseille who live below the poverty line, against 15 per cent nationally. 15: The number of men, mostly from northern districts, shot dead in the city's drug wars. 300: The number of Kalashnikovs reportedly intercepted in Marseille this year. Sport Michael Clarke of Australia and James Anderson of England exchange words * Print Marseille battles image as France's murder capital By Tom Esslemont BBC News, Marseille Pictures on a school wall in Marseille, France Schools in the deprived north of the city have reduced the drop-out rate Continue reading the main story -- * France country profile France's second city, Marseille, has become synonymous with drug-related violence in recent years but local politicians are fighting to change that image. Between the grey high rises of the northern districts, trains pass every few minutes. -- Murder spike According to police figures, a third of all the murders in France in 2012 took place in the Marseille region. Blocks of flats in Marseille Much of the violence occurs in the poor northern suburbs Children in a built-up area of Marseille Parents say young children are vulnerable to the drug gangs A view of the Tour St Jean in Marseille The city fathers want to project a new image of Marseille as a city of culture Victims are usually in their late teens and twenties. Many of them are thought to have been caught up in organised crime. -- In spite of a recent spike in the murder rate - there were at least 24 in 2012 and 20 in 2011 - the level of criminality is not as high as it once was. In the early 1960s, as the war for Algeria's independence ended, hundreds of thousands of French people returned from former colonies in North Africa. Many settled in Marseille where new high-rises were built to accommodate them. In the ensuing years the city gained a reputation for its vibrant multiculturalism, as well as for its link in the "French Connection", through which gangs trafficked heroin from Turkey to Europe and on to the United States. 'Ghetto feeling' "The city's geography has a lot to do with its problems," says sociologist Laurent Mucchielli at the University of Aix-Marseille, referring not only to the seaside location, but to social segregation between a poorer north and a richer south. "The poorer classes traditionally live in the northern districts… meaning that social barriers have been constructed between north and south." -- "We try to make the children aware of their surroundings and make sure they have access to a cultural education." In the run-up to mayoral elections in Marseille next year, opposition parties have taken on the centre-right municipality on issues of social deprivation. Senator and Socialist mayoral candidate Samia Ghali is campaigning for more extra-curricular activities for children in school to help them avoid falling in with the street gangs. -- The far-right National Front (FN) has also seized on the problem and is campaigning hard. Its leader, Marine Le Pen, described the crime wave as gangrenous, telling a party conference last month that it was "the shape of things to come". Were the anti-immigrant FN to capitalise on the problem in a multi-ethnic city like Marseille it would worry the governing left and the centre-right UMP, which controls the city mayoralty. Jobs drive -- My political vision is for everyone to live together as a community” End Quote Jean-Claude Gaudin Mayor of Marseille But the city's UMP mayor, Jean-Claude Gaudin, denies his municipality has failed in its efforts: "When I took over as mayor in 1995, unemployment in this city was 21.6%. -- "Today it is at 13%. I have not stopped lowering the rate. My political vision is for everyone to live together as a community." Outside his grand office by the port, new museums and galleries have opened up - all part of Marseille's year as the European Capital of Culture. It is all a far cry from the north of the city where all the talk is of a lack of investment and unemployment and where, in the stairwell of Baya Seddik's apartment, there is a pungent smell of urine and cannabis. -- Ms Seddik now campaigns for opportunities for young people in her district. From her apartment, where pictures of Nabil hang on the wall, you can just make out the sound of the trains heading to and from the beating heart of Marseille. More on This Story * 5 Rumour Mill: Celtic | Rangers | McCoist | Brown City guide: Marseille, France The The "Vieux-Port" of Marseille. Picture: Getty * by JANET CHRISTIE -- Print this THE capital of Provence, Marseille may share a Riviera location with Nice, St Tropez, Cannes and Monte Carlo, but it’s a city devoid of its neighbours’ glitz. Rougher around the edges, it’s more working port than playboy playground, but is none the less a bustling city full of excitement and change. With its nomination as this year’s cultural capital of Europe, it is also the beneficiary of huge regeneration that has seen galleries, concert halls and eateries springing up in the old port area. Thanks to a maritime past dating from Greek and Roman times, Marseille is a melting pot of cultures and races (a quarter of its population of one million is of North African origin) and it has some of the best restaurants in the country. With hills on three sides and water on the fourth, it has a hinterland of rugged beauty that makes it a unique short break destination and a city that’s a breath of fresh air after the lavender-saturated Provençal villages so beloved and of the home counties set. WHERE TO STAY -- WHAT TO DRINK PASTIS is a regional obsession so indulge yourself in the heady concoction of liquorice, star anise, peppercorns, cinnamon, cardamom, nutmeg and sage at Mama Shelter Marseille, sister of the Philippe Starck-designed hotel in Paris. For a selection of over 100 varieties, check out La Maison du Pastis or just dip into any supermarket – you’ll be spoiled for choice. Mama Shelter, 62 Rue de La Loubière (www.mamashelter.com/marseille); La Maison du Pastis, 108 Quai du Port (www.lamaisondupastis.com) BEST READ DIP into one of local hero writer and film-maker Marcel Pagnol’s classics while sitting on a bar stool at the Bar de la Marine, which makes an appearance in his tales of early 20th-century Marseille and its people. His celebration of the peasant life of the hilly villages of Provence where he holidayed have made him one of France’s best-loved writers, but he was a city boy at heart. WHERE TO VISIT VISIT the Quartier du Panier, the oldest part of the city that dates back to the Greeks, for which it’s worth booking a guided tour. It’s also home to the Centre de la Vieille Charité, a stunning building that was once a poorhouse, and now has extensive galleries on three levels surrounding the courtyard. At Interface, a former granary, there’s contemporary art and edgy installations, as Marseille seeks to reinvent itself as a city of culture and shake off the air of neglect that settled after the partial closure of the port. Centre de la Vieille Charité, 2 rue de la Charité (00 33 4 91 56 28 38, www.vieille-charite-marseille.org) BEST BOAT TRIP -- HEAD down to the old port for boats out to the Château d’If and tour the famous prison of the Count of Monte Cristo, or discover the incredible cliffs of nearby Calanques national park, the biggest land and maritime national park in Europe, on a solar-powered boat. Prices vary (www.marseille-tourisme.com) DIRECT flights from Edinburgh and Glasgow are offered by Ryanair, British Airways and Air France, starting from around £200. A City Pass Marseille offers one day (€22) or two days (€29) of open access for visits, transport and special deals, access to 12 museums, guided tours and visits to the If Islands or Frioul, plus access on the entire bus, train and tramway network. MORE STORIES Explore real-time news, visually Marseille, France, hit by rising drug-related violence JEAN-PAUL PELISSIER/Reuters - French policemen check the identity papers with a resident during a control operation in apartment housing buildings at Air-Bel in Marseille, on March 15, 2013. By Edward Cody, E-mail the writer MARSEILLE, France — This was supposed to be the year for Marseille. The gritty Mediterranean port, France’s second-largest city, was appointed the “cultural capital of Europe,” a rotating European Union honor. City fathers launched beautification projects, created new tourism attractions and invited people from around the world to visit. A splendid stone esplanade was laid around the Old Port, peppered with novel sculpture, and a high-tech historical museum went up next to City Hall. -- Each side blames the other for mortar and artillery attacks that are occurring as tensions rise over Afghanistan. But despite the cultural renaissance — not to mention Marseille’s famed fish soup — all people here are talking about is murder and drug trafficking. In the past two weeks, five killings have been recorded that police say are linked to gang wars for control of hashish sales in the city’s infamous high-rise slums. The eruption has refocused attention on Marseille’s long-standing reputation as a European drug-smuggling hub, a place where entire neighborhoods have slipped away from police control and fallen under the command of gangsters who earn millions importing and selling North African hashish and settle turf disputes with AK-47 assault rifles. “Marseille is sick with its violence,” Interior Minister Manuel Valls said. Vowing to squash the drug trade and end the violence, Valls last week dispatched 250 paramilitary and other national police officers to reinforce the usual deployment of around 3,000. The night after they were deployed, with television cameras in tow, another body was found, burned to a crisp with a bullet in its charred skull, the execution method local traffickers call the “barbecue.” The next day, two Turkish immigrants were shot and wounded, and a pair of youths driving by on a motor scooter opened fire with a pistol on a third man, wounding him in the legs. Mayor Jean-Claude Gaudin, from the conservative Union for a Popular Movement (UMP), said the city is doing its best to improve the poor suburbs, inhabited mainly by North African immigrants, where youth unemployment is double the national average of 10 percent. But he said ending drug violence in Marseille is mainly up to the Socialist-run government in Paris headed by President Francois Hollande. “We are making great efforts, but the safety of people and property depends essentially on the government,” Gaudin said in a Q&A with the newspaper Le Figaro. “I would like the government to fully realize that Marseille needs to be helped.” Gaudin’s statement underlined the political quotient in Marseille’s violence. The city, along with others across France, has scheduled municipal elections next year. A particularly important prize with 850,000 residents, Marseille has become the target of several potential Socialist and UMP candidates. Moreover, security was a major focus of the conservative former president Nicolas Sarkozy and Hollande is eager to show he, too, can be tough on crime. Valls, his interior minister, has made a reputation as anything but a squishy liberal in the 10 months since Hollande took office. #publisher Football RSS feed David Beckham RSS feed Paris Saint-Germain RSS feed Marseille RSS feed Sport RSS feed Turn autoplay off -- Coupe de France last 16 David Beckham plays his part as PSG beat Marseille in French Cup ⢠Paris Saint-Germain 2-0 Marseille ⢠Ibrahimovic 34 64pen * Share -- Link to video: David Beckham responds to yellow card on PSG first start This arena's third Classique of the campaign had entered its latter stages, Paris St-Germain so assured and their opponents distinctly rattled, when Jordan Ayew ploughed into French football's latest star attraction and finally left him rattled. David Beckham picked himself out of the tangle of bodies on the byline and eye-balled the Marseille substitute as players, Joey Barton principal among them, squared up all around. The flash of yellow shown to the victim of the lunge felt harsh but Beckham will hardly care. Whether plying your trade in Manchester or Madrid, being booked against bitter rivals can serve as a badge of honour. Four weeks into his latest eye-catching career move and the former England captain is already cherished. He revelled for 86 minutes in an Andrea Pirlo brief here on his first start for one of the richest clubs in the world, his name boomed into the night sky in appreciation by a giddy home support, celebrating victory and a French Cup quarter-final at Evian to come, when he eventually retreated to the bench shortly after that show of temper. "His experience, his passing, his aggression," enthused the manager, Carlo Ancelotti. "He will help us this season. I don't think he played like a 37-year-old tonight." In some ways he had. His was a masterclass in clever, calm distribution from the base of midfield, all that experience accrued at Manchester United, Real Madrid and Milan demonstrated in his positioning, movement and delivery. It had been his pass that opened up the left side of Marseille's defence for Kévin Gameiro to chase and cross for Zlatan Ibrahimovic on the quarter-hour mark, the Swede fluffing the first clear opportunity of the evening. It was also Le Spice Boy's quickly taken free-kick moments later that sent Jérémy Ménez through on goal while visiting players still disputed the award. The miss that followed was wasteful, but Beckham's involvement in the buildup all night was tidy, reassuring, even metronomic. "I felt good," he said. "I have been working hard for the last few weeks on my fitness, and it helps to have players around me who work the way they do and play the way they do. To have been involved in these last two games has been encouraging. I came to the club wanting to be part of the team, but knowing I wouldn't always be in the starting lineup, and I understand that. I just wanted to try and add to the side and help the team be successful. If that means starting, then great. If that means coming off the bench, then fine. But to play 86 minutes was good. I enjoyed it, and felt good. It's always nice not having freezing cold feet when you start, after all." That was a reference to his cameo in Sunday's league fixture between the sides, a 16-minute appearance that had whetted the appetite. He had played a part in setting up Ibrahimovic's goal in stoppage time that night with Marseille having, rather mystifyingly, stood off the debutant and allowed him to exert his influence. The same criticism of Elie Baup's side might have been made here. Surely the temptation must have been there for Barton or Jacques-Alaixys Romao to snap into a challenge and stifle his supply line, yet it took 25 minutes for the Englishman to crunch his compatriot. By the time Romao did likewise shortly afterwards, prompting the first melee of a typically fractious occasion, the Paris club led courtesy of Ibrahimovic's neatly taken goal. The Swede, who has been banned for PSG's next two Champions League games following his dismissal in the last-16 tie at Valencia, added the second-half penalty to seal the victory before Marseille's frustrations overcame them. Romao leapt into an illegal challenge on Beckham, Barton caught him with a flailing elbow. The reaction to Ayew was perhaps more understandable given the rat-a-tat of similar bruising fouls that had preceded the offence. "It was spiky the whole game," added Beckham. "It was like that at the weekend and it will be like that every PSG against Marseille game. Joey caught me with an elbow, but he 'explained' it just after. He does well for them and is a talented player. Good luck to him." That was said with a smile though, in truth, Barton was rather bypassed here with his side off the pace against the outstanding team in French football, one that has been constructed to the tune of £250m by Qatari owners who can idly consider bidding £40m for Wayne Rooney without giving a second thought to such an outlay. Beckham is the free transfer amid the astronomical fees, the veteran enjoying another European swansong to a glittering career. And yet, a month in, he has already been christened "La Bonne Pioche" in Paris, loosely speaking a "bargain" who is reaping rewards. His name was chorused around this arena upon his departure. His has been an encouraging start. -- Close this popup PSG 2-0 Marseille | French Cup match report This article was published on the Guardian website at 21.55 GMT on Wednesday 27 February 2013. A version appeared on p44 of the Main section section of the Guardian on Thursday 28 February 2013. It was last modified at 19.51 BST on Wednesday 3 July 2013. -- * David Beckham · * Paris Saint-Germain · * Marseille Sport #publisher Football RSS feed QPR RSS feed Marseille RSS feed Sport RSS feed Turn autoplay off -- * QPR QPR's Djibril Cissé relishes chance of move back to Marseille ⢠French striker says playing in Championship 'complicated' -- Djibril Cisse of QPR Djibril Cissé of Queens Park Rangers is keen on a return move to Marseille. Photograph: Chris Brunskill/Getty Images Djibril Cissé is eyeing a move back to Marseille after admitting playing in the Championship with Queens Park Rangers appears "complicated". Rangers' two-year spell in the Premier League came to an end on Sunday with a goalless draw at Reading and Cissé, whose loan spell at the Qatari club Al Gharafa expires at the end of the season, is already talking up a move away from Loftus Road. -- The 32-year-old told France Football: "Given how it has gone for them from a sporting viewpoint, (a return to QPR) does seem complicated." Cissé would relish a switch to Marseille, a club he joined on loan from Liverpool in 2006 before making the move permanent. "It would be a dream to go back," said Cissé, "or play for any club which can make me shine." Cissé is hoping a move back to Europe can enhance his chances of representing France at the World Cup finals next summer. "I have Les Bleus in my heart," he said. "If I'm in a good team and if I do a good job I think it's possible. -- Close this popup QPR's Djibril Cissé relishes chance of move back to Marseille This article was published on the Guardian website at 10.44 BST on Tuesday 30 April 2013. -- * QPR · * Marseille Sport #publisher Football RSS feed Arsenal RSS feed Arsène Wenger RSS feed Marseille RSS feed Champions League RSS feed Sport RSS feed Turn autoplay off -- * Arsenal Arsenal in confident mood for Marseille mission despite several injuries ⢠Olivier Giroud declares himself fit for Gunners -- * Email * Stuart James in Marseille * * The Guardian, Tuesday 17 September 2013 20.56 BST -- [Arsenals-Ars-ne-Wenger-wa-012.jpg] [javascript] Link to video: Arsenal's Arsène Wenger wary of Marseille's Champions League home advantage Arsenal touched down in the south of France in confident mood as they aim to start the Champions League group stage with a 10th successive away win in all competitions, but the lack of depth in their squad has become a genuine concern for Arsène Wenger and his players. Olivier Giroud, who has given Arsenal a major boost by declaring himself fit to start against Marseille on Wednesday night, admitted he is "a bit scared" about the paucity of Wenger's options and predicted problems ahead. Although Wenger can name a strong starting XI against the French runners-up, including Mesut Ãzil, the substitutes' bench looks threadbare in the absence of Mikel Arteta, Lukas Podolski, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Santi Cazorla, Tomas Rosicky, Yaya Sanogo and Abou Diaby, all of whom remain injured. "We're a really united squad and everyone works for the team," said Giroud, who was struggling with a knee injury after Saturday's 3-1 victory at Sunderland. "That's good, we have a quality squad but I'm a bit scared about the numbers we have in the squad. We will face problems because of the numbers in our squad. But we'll do everything we can to rival the big clubs." Wenger admitted he harbours his own worries. "For Marseille, all the players who had little doubts are OK. But I am concerned because we play now for two months every three or four days and it's important to get some players back, because you cannot play for the next two months with the squad we have at the moment." As well as Giroud, Wenger is able to call upon Per Mertesacker, who missed the Sunderland match through illness. The Germany international is likely to be restored to central defence, with Carl Jenkinson dropping to the bench and Bacary Sagna moving to right-back, as Arsenal attempt to continue their remarkable form on their travels, which started with a 2-0 victory over Bayern Munich in the Allianz Arena in March, when they were eliminated from the Champions League on away goals. -- "We're an exceptional team, that is the main thing," Mertesacker said. "We built that up from last season. We built our confidence up, especially the 10 games at the end of last season where we did not lose. You could feel it from the first day that there is something special, apart from the first game [against Aston Villa when Arsenal lost 3-1]. But nobody dropped and the performance went well after that as well. We have showed we are ready to keep our run going." Stade Vélodrome, which resembles a building site with major work going on to redevelop the ground before the 2016 European Championships, would be a good place to make it 10 straight away wins. Marseille are no pushovers â they are fourth in Ligue 1 and have five France internationals in their squad â but in a so-called group of death that includes Borussia Dortmund, last season's runners-up in the Champions League, and Napoli, the runners-up in Serie A, this game may well represent Arsenal's best chance to pick up the away win that could be crucial to their hopes of reaching the knockout stage. "If you look at the group, it is the hardest because all four teams have a chance to qualify, that means every game is very important, and on average you need 10 points to qualify, so that gives you the task," Wenger said. "We have a good away record â we have always been very audacious away. Sometimes at home, through some spells last season, we played a bit with the handbrake because we have not had the same confidence at the Emirates that we have away from home. But we will always try to play." -- Close this popup Arsenal in confident mood for Marseille mission despite several injuries This article was published on the Guardian website at 20.56 BST on Tuesday 17 September 2013. A version appeared on p46 of the Main section section of the Guardian on Wednesday 18 September 2013. It was last modified at 12.03 BST on Wednesday 18 September 2013. -- * Arsenal · * Arsène Wenger · * Marseille · * Champions League #publisher Football RSS feed Joey Barton RSS feed Marseille RSS feed QPR RSS feed Sport RSS feed Turn autoplay off -- * Joey Barton Joey Barton's contract claims denied by Marseille's president ⢠French club's president would like to keep player, however -- * theguardian.com, Wednesday 10 April 2013 12.37 BST Joey Barton in action for Marseille Joey Barton in action for Marseille. Photograph: Guillaume Horcajuelo/EPA Joey Barton's claims that a deal is in place for him to stay at Marseille have been denied by the club's president, Vincent Labrune. Barton, currently on loan at the French club from relegation-threatened QPR, tweeted that he would not be returning to Loftus Road next season. "Some strange people think that I'll be playing in the Championship next season?? Good one! QPR might, I won't! #fact," he wrote. "It's not up to QPR if I stay. Agreement already in place for me to stay here. Can't see QPR wanting me on the wage bill in the Champ." Barton said that Marseille are now in his blood and Labrune confirmed the club would be interested in keeping the midfielder but added that nothing is in place. Labrune was quoted on eurosport.fr as saying: "We would not be against the idea of keeping Joey Barton at OM but he belongs to QPR. There is no agreement as suggested by Joey Barton." The QPR chairman, Tony Fernandes, posted a pointed tweet which appears to be a response to Barton's claim that it is not up to the club whether he stays. "For the record QPR players under contract cannot decide where they play. They are under CONTRACT," Fernandes wrote. Barton joined Marseille in August while he was serving a 12-match ban incurred during the last game of the 2011-12 season against Manchester City. Over a series of tweets, Barton expressed his hope that QPR stay up, made a pointed jibe at former manager Mark Hughes and confirmed his commitment to Marseille. He wrote: "My QPR career was over when they decided to listen to the footballing sage, Mark of Hughes ⦠I'm loving life in France. Loving Marseille. They love me. "All I want to do is give everything for this football club. They backed me when nobody else did, for that I will be eternally grateful. This club is now in my blood, its impossible to get it out [sic] #ForzaOM. "I really hope they [QPR] stay up. I have all season. Stay up/go down. Harry stays/goes. I don't want to be part of it. Marseille is my home now." Daily Email close -- Close this popup Joey Barton's contract claims denied by Marseille's president This article was published on the Guardian website at 12.37 BST on Wednesday 10 April 2013. It was last modified at 14.32 BST on Wednesday 10 April 2013. -- * Joey Barton · * Marseille · * QPR #publisher Football RSS feed Marseille RSS feed World news RSS feed France RSS feed Europe RSS feed Turn autoplay off -- * Sport * Football * Marseille Olympic Marseille struggle to attract top talent due to 'home-jacking' Vitorino Hilton and Lucho González among Marseille players to suffer armed robberies at their homes * Share * Tweet this -- lucho gonzalez Olympic Marseille's Lucho Gonzalez, right, seen training here with Pape Douada M'Bow, is among the victims of a spate of violent robberies of players at the club. Photograph: Bertrand Langlois/AFP/Getty Images Marseille's efforts to shed its reputation as a crime capital have been dealt a blow with a warning from the city's football team that a spate of violent robberies of star players is making it difficult to attract top talent to the club. The homes of players for Olympic Marseille, the Ligue 1 team and former French champions, have become a regular target for armed robberies, known as "home-jackings". This week the Brazilian defender Vitorino Hilton was at his gated Marseille home with 10 family members when an armed gang of six broke in just before midnight. They held the footballer's relatives hostage before hitting Hilton on the head with the butt of a gun several times and escaping with cash, jewellery, computers and designer bags. Hilton told French radio station RMC: "As I'd been hit on the head, I was bleeding a lot, [my children] panicked." He said his children were scared and wanted to go back to Brazil. -- The Argentinian Lucho González, one of the highest paid footballers in France, was said to have been left traumatised after an armed gang attacked him and his family at home in Aix-en-Provence in March. After 10 attacks on players in 18 months Olympic Marseille announced it had set up private security patrols around players' homes in the city and surrounding area, and called on local authorities to crack down on crime. Marseille will be European capital of culture in 2013 and is undergoing major architectural and cultural renovations. But Olympic Marseille's sporting director, José Anigo, said he was struggling to attract new star players because of the city's reputation. "Every time I signed a player this year the first questions they asked were 'can you guarantee security?' and 'are my family at risk?'" he told a press conference. "Bringing players to Marseille in those conditions is complicated. You have to be a magician." The club said it would be nonsensical to tell players not to wear designer watches and drive expensive cars. "Everyone has the right to profit from their earnings," said Anigo. -- Close this popup Olympic Marseille struggle to attract top talent due to 'home-jacking' This article was published on the Guardian website at 15.08 BST on Thursday 14 July 2011. A version appeared on p21 of the Main section section of the Guardian on Friday 15 July 2011. It was last modified at 11.31 BST on Friday 12 July 2013. Football * Marseille World news #publisher Football RSS feed Joey Barton RSS feed QPR RSS feed Marseille RSS feed Sport RSS feed Turn autoplay off -- * Joey Barton Joey Barton may be heading back to QPR after Marseille wages impasse ⢠Midfielder wants to make loan to French club permanent ⢠QPR want him to move, Marseille cannot afford wages * Share * Tweet this -- Jérémy Menez Joey Barton David Beckham Joey Barton, centre, collides with Paris Saint-Germain's Jérémy Menez, left, and David Beckham during his loan spell with Marseille. Photograph: Michel Euler/AP Joey Barton may yet have to return to Queens Park Rangers in the Championship next season because an agreement is apparently still no closer between Marseille and the relegated London club to make his loan move permanent. The midfielder spent last season on loan at Stade Vélodrome, helping Elie Baup's side to a second-place finish and Champions League qualification, and aspires to remain in France particularly after his parent club slipped out of the Premier League. However, Marseille have indicated they would be unable to take on Barton's wages of around £65,000 a week and would need him to halve those salary demands for any deal to be reached. QPR, who are understood to be willing to allow the player to leave without a fee, paid half of his wages last season but are keen to shift him entirely from their books as they readjust financially to relegation. It remains to be seen whether Baup opts to pursue a deal which would eat significantly into his own budget for next season, effectively leaving all three parties in a state of limbo. Barton, who is in Northern Ireland studying for his Uefa A licence as a coach, is under contract at Loftus Road until 2015. He confirmed last week that, if no deal is reached with Marseille this summer, he could return to France when his current contract expires, when he will be 32. Daily Email close -- Close this popup Joey Barton may be heading back to QPR after Marseille wages impasse This article was published on the Guardian website at 17.13 BST on Tuesday 11 June 2013. It was last modified at 17.41 BST on Tuesday 11 June 2013. -- * Joey Barton · * QPR · * Marseille Sport