The French President will take part in the day of mourning in Martigny on Friday. In doing so, he is also sending a signal to the Swiss judiciary.
Jan 9, 2026, 6:55 a.mJan 9, 2026, 6:55 a.m
Stefan Brändle, Paris / ch media
The fact that Emmanuel Macron is coming to personally commemorate the Crans-Montana fire victims on Friday shows how great the pain is and remains in France. Nine mostly young French people died in the flaming inferno and 21 were injured, some seriously.
We have to get it done: French President Emmanuel Macron in front of his country’s ambassadors on Thursday.Image: keystone
The Paris media reported on parents who had to desperately search for their offspring in five countries as far away as Germany, in increasing fear and panic of the worst possible decision – which sometimes came.
France learns more every day about the highly flammable ceiling insulation in “Le Constellation”, the narrow basement stairs and the only, yet unusable, emergency exit. Two surviving French women named Victoria and Albane told the TV station BFM how the bar was completely on fire within a few seconds. It was “like a horror movie,” recalled Adrien, a young Frenchman.
In France, the initial shock and pain gave way to dismay, even anger, over the construction errors in the bar. Individual towns remain in deep mourning for the deceased, Besançon for Noa (14), Angers for Matéo (23), Toulouse for Noémie (26). There were three middle school students from Versailles, Valentin, Artus and Edgar, hopeful representatives of the renowned private school Saint-Jean Hulst. However, they are in the emergency rooms with serious and severe burn injuries. Countless anonymous citizens of the former royal city have already prayed for them at a church service so that they would stay alive.
Paris criminal proceedings
No wonder the head of state is traveling to the homage in Martigny. As we hear from Bern, he will accompany victims’ relatives. Certainly out of personal concern and solidarity with grieving compatriots, but also in the awareness that he knows how to translate such perceived appearances into TV images – he, who is himself battered and isolated in terms of domestic politics.
Macron will also be in Martigny on Friday.Image: keystone
But Macron’s presence allows for another reading. The obvious misconduct of those responsible has already resulted in Switzerland’s reputation for solid reliability being badly dented.
Several French-speaking Swiss lawyers, such as Romain Jordan from Geneva or Sébastien Fanti from Sion, do not speak well of the municipal authorities of Crans in the Paris media. Why wasn’t there a house search or detention to preserve evidence? they ask emphatically, only to answer themselves: Now it’s too late for that, now the Facebook pictures of the foam blanket have already been deleted.
And while the pressure on the Valais Attorney General Béatrice Pilloud is increasing, it became known in Paris that the French public prosecutor’s office has initiated proceedings. A disavowal of the Swiss justice system? The French prosecutor Laure Beccuau says no: Such additional proceedings in a neighboring country are “very classic”; It is not directed against the main proceedings, but is intended to offer the French victims a point of contact.
Beccuau further promised that a second trial was not planned in Paris. Her country’s highest prosecutor emphasized that France would “provide legal assistance extremely quickly and efficiently” if Switzerland requested it. However, this has not yet happened, not even with regard to the host who comes from France.
This can almost be read as a call to Switzerland to move forward in good German. Macron is also likely to insist on this on Friday. Of course not head-on – the occasion is unsuitable for that, and Macron likes things diplomatically. But he could, for example, make a reference by praising the traditionally impeccable cooperation between the French and Swiss judiciaries.
And he would be right: after this tragedy, after all the already known mistakes, only impeccable work by the responsible authorities is now allowed. And from a French perspective, impeccable also means: not with the usual Swiss thoughtfulness – s’il vous plaît! (aargauerzeitung.ch)