By Matthieu Buge, who has worked on Russia for the magazine l’Histoire, the Russian film magazine Séance, and as a columnist for Le Courrier de Russie. He is the author of the book Le Cauchemar russe (‘The Russian Nightmare’)
By Matthieu Buge, who has worked on Russia for the magazine l’Histoire, the Russian film magazine Séance, and as a columnist for Le Courrier de Russie. He is the author of the book Le Cauchemar russe (‘The Russian Nightmare’)
Is France becoming a new Mexico? While gangland killings are increasingly common across the country – even in places such as Nantes, which was considered the most pleasant French city in 2012 – attacks targeting elected officials are not usual.
During the night of July 20-21, the mayor of Ales in the south of France, Christophe Rivenq, was exfiltrated from his home by the elite RAID tactical unit (Recherche, Assistance, Intervention, Dissuasion) and put under protection. According to Le Parisien, there was probably a car bomb next to his house. A few days before, Rivenq said his wife found tags on the fence and a letter in the mailbox with two 9 mm bullets and the signature of the DZ Mafia.
The DZ Mafia is a network of organized criminal groups forming a kind of cartel. It first became famous under this designation in 2023, but everything started long ago in the northern districts of Marseille before expanding – so far, we know that it is active in France, Belgium, Morocco, and Italy. They are accused of murder, assassination, drug trafficking, extortion, money laundering, procuring, and kidnapping.
The name ‘DZ Mafia’ refers to the alpha-2 code for Algeria (DZ). The origins of the organization’s founding members and historical sections chiefs couldn’t be clearer. But the group headed by Mehdi Abdelatif Laribi has rivals. Apart from the traditional gangs of gypsies, they fight with ‘the Yodas’, founded by Felix Bingui (half French, half Central African), and ‘the Blacks’, founded by two brothers from the Comoros. While it’s impossible to know if they were all born in France and are second or third-generation immigrants or if some arrived there later, they all started their business in the notorious gateway into France that is Marseille.
The French connection really had a makeover. And with Europe importing migrants endlessly, the face and size of the mafia in France will keep mutating.
According to a 2025 report of the French Monitoring Center for Drugs and Drug Addiction, the French drug market nearly tripled in value from 2010 to 2023, rising from an estimated €2.3 billion to 6.8 billion. Gangs make so much money that they can easily corrupt, threaten, and infiltrate formal economic activities. That’s no small drug-dealing business at the corner of a street. As it is part of a mayor’s duties to fight drug trafficking, Rivenq indeed has reasons to be worried.
But Rivenq is only a mayor. What can a local politician can do if this gang is able to corrupt the authorities and high-ranking politicians rumored to be drug users? According to FranceInfo: “While the fight against drug trafficking has been declared a national priority by the government, several testimonies corroborate the fact that some members of parliament and staff use narcotics, particularly to cope with workload and pressure.” Coming from state media, that sounds like a euphemism.
The French government does not do much against these gangs – and even if it really wanted to, would it be able to act? The police can’t enter many neighborhoods where gangsters are in charge, who even ‘take care’ of the poor population (for example, providing school supplies to families) in order to prevent outside meddling in their business.
Two days after the mayor’s exfiltration, the DZ Mafia published a video in which, wearing masks and speaking behind a table covered with an Algerian flag marked ‘DZ’, they denied being behind these threats, saying that the method was despicable and that other people did this to harm their image. French media noted that on Rivenq’s wall was the acronym ‘DZ NG’ (DZ New Generation). It appears that there’s a split among the founding members after a deal gone wrong. The journalists’ conclusion? DZ Mafia’s recent developments resemble the split of the Mexican Sinaloa cartel and the founding of Jalisco New Generation cartel. The latter is considered by Mexico as one of the country’s most dangerous criminal organizations. ‘We are at war’, the French politicians say. At this stage, they’d better learn how to say ‘ay caramba!’ in Arabic.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
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