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France to reward illegal immigrant hero with residency

An illegal immigrant who was injured while rescuing people from a blazing building is to have his application for residency fast-tracked as a reward for his bravery.

Two people, including a pregnant woman, died in the fire on 7 June, outside Paris
Two people, including a pregnant woman, died in the fire on 7 June, outside Paris AFP PHOTO/JOEL ESTIENNE
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The 26 year old Tunisian was hailed as a hero by neighbours after he helped several people to safety during a fire in the block of flats on Saturday, which killed three people including a pregnant woman.

“We are to see the young man on Tuesday afternoon to examine his case with a view to regularising his status,” declared a police spokesperson who suggested that the processing of his application would be accelerated, “as a reward for his bravery.”

The young man, known as Mohssen, is a mechanic and was living in a top floor flat which had been sublet to him in the six-floor block in Aubervilliers, on the outskirts of Paris.

He told the French newspaper Le Parisien how he found two young girls in the block.

“They were trapped, alone in the apartment. I kicked open the door. I told them that we weren’t going to die.”

He said he knocked on all the doors telling people to get out of the building “I told them not to go down the stairs, it was too dangerous. I broke a window on the second floor but it was too hot to get out,” he continued.

Instead he and others climbed down scaffolding which had been erected by workmen who were repairing the front of the building.

“If there hadn’t been scaffolding there, we would have died,” he said.

A twelve year old boy has been charged with arson after he admitted setting fire to a push chair in the block on Saturday.

 

 

 

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