Migrants being moved from the La Chapelle fdistrict of Paris on FridayEric Feferberg/AFP
Paris police early on Friday morning moved some 2,500 migrants who had been living rough in the north of the city to centres in the surrounding region and elsewhere in France, officials said.
The evacuation, which went ahead smoothly, entailed moving migrants who had been living around a centre set up in the Porte de la Chapelle area last November.
The authorities used 60 buses to disperse the migrants to other locations in the Paris region, mainly school gymnasiums that have become available during the holiday season.
Police, local council officials, immigration officials and some NGOs took part in the operation, the 34th since 2015.
NGOs had raised the alarm over the appalling conditions in the improvised camp and the lack of health facilities.
Since the closure of the "Jungle" camp in Calais, Paris has become the main destination for migrants in France.
The city council on Friday called for migrant centres to be opened in various parts of France, "in an organised way as they do in Italy and Germany", as deputy mayor Dominique Versini put it.
She paid tribute to the "capacity of acceptance and generosity" of the inhabitants of Paris's 18th arrondissement, where the centre is located, claiming that 37,000 migrants had been through the area since May and noting that the far-right National Front had failed to pick up support in recent elections.
President Emmanuel Macron's government is to propose a new law on the right to asylum and migration within the next few days.
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