Towards a return of the migrant roadblocks on the Calais bypass?

• Several dams have been erected in recent nights on the Calais harbor bypass.

• According to the police, it is the act of migrants who obstruct traffic in an attempt to get into trucks.

• A small series that does not hide the return of a phenomenon, authorities and associations agreeing that it has never stopped.

Makeshift dams have been erected on the Calais harbor bypass for two nights in the last 4 days. According to the police, these facts are to be attributed to migrants who use this dangerous ploy to board trucks bound for Great Britain. Does this mean the return of a phenomenon that was recurrent during the “jungle” era to get around the difficulty of crossing the Strait of Pas-de-Calais in “small boats”? Not really, actually.

During the night of January 3 to 4, a roadblock made up of various branches placed across the A16 motorway, near Calais, was cleared by the police.

A new intervention of this type took place on the night of Wednesday to Thursday for another dam, this time erected in the area of ​​garbage cans, boards and carts.

If no arrest has taken place in both cases, the Pas-de-Calais police say that the perpetrators are migrants.

A question of "weather" or "means"

If this practice was common until 2019, it then faded with the resurgence of crossings to England on makeshift boats. So much so that in 2021, a record was set with more than 28,000 people having reached the British coast by this means. However, the authorities and associations agree in recognizing that migrants have never really abandoned the illegal crossings in trucks.

“It really depends on the weather, when they can't cross by boat, they fall back on the trucks passing by the bypass. Nevertheless, it is still much less frequent than at the time ”, assures a police source to

. In addition to the weather, our source also recognizes that in the event of "a strong presence on the coast, they try to cross to the other side".

Pierre, coordinator at the Auberge de migrants, makes the same observation but with different arguments.

“It is above all a question of resources.

The exiles who do not have the money to finance a boat crossing will try their luck by getting into trucks, ”he explains to

.

For him, however, the use of roadblocks has become extremely rare: “We saw this a lot at the time of the '' jungle '' since it was very close to the highway.

Today, the exiles are rather trying to get into the trucks on the roundabouts ”.

Society

France-England: More than 28,000 migrants crossed the Channel in 2021, a record

Lille

Calais: Four injured including three migrants in a brawl

• Immigration

• Barrage

• Migrants

• Society

• 0 comment

• 0 share

  • Share on Messenger

  • Share on Facebook

  • Share on twitter

  • Share on Flipboard

  • Share on Pinterest

  • Share on Linkedin

  • Send by Mail

• To safeguard

• A fault ?

• To print