The mayor of Bressolles, Fabrice Beauvois, believes Pokemon Go is simply too much of a threat to his 800-strong community.
He made headlines on Wednesday after signing a municipal decree to ban the game, and he reportedly contacted the game's producer Niantic in an effort to get the village wiped off the Pokemon map, reported Le Progres newspaper.
Beauvois said that the game caused “too much distraction for pedestrians and for motorists who are looking at their phones while driving”.
He said that he believed it was his duty to prevent what he called “a contagious and uncontrolled spread of the phenomenon”, not to mention that it is “dangerously addictive” for young people.
He also called for people to form evening groups in a bid to help prevent people from playing the game.
While such a ban might be hard to enforce without the help of Niantic, the mayor is not wrong to think the game can be dangerous.
Indeed, France has already seen several accidents involving motorists and Pokemon.
In July France saw at least two car accidents because of the game. And some teens were arrested in southern France for bursting into a police barracks trying to hunt Pokemon.
And while no village or town in France has managed to ban the game yet, it has been banned from certain sites.
Earlier this month, a French World War I memorial was removed from Pokemon Go following complaints about players gathering to do battle at a site containing the remains of 130,000 soldiers.
Elsewhere, authorities in Iran banned the app over unspecified “security concerns”, with the Pentagon in the US urging its troops to avoid the game too.
Photo: AFP
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