Europe 1 with AFP 5:52 p.m., November 11, 2022

The French police indicate that the reinforced controls at the Franco-Italian border, decided by Paris after Rome's refusal to let the Ocean Viking dock, have been effective since Thursday 8 p.m. on "more than ten" crossing points, including in mountain areas.

The reinforced controls at the Franco-Italian border, decided by Paris after Rome's refusal to let the Ocean Viking dock, have been effective since 8 p.m. Thursday on "more than a dozen" crossing points, including in the mountains, French police told AFP on Friday.

It is a question of "controlling the stations, the secondary axes in particular near Menton but also Sospel or Breil-sur-Roya, the motorway axes, in particular the A8, the exits, tolls and motorway areas", specified the General Directorate of the National Police (DGPN).

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Nearly 500 additional police and gendarmes will be mobilized for checks on these "authorized crossing points (PPA)", in order to guarantee "H24 security", the same source said.

Mountain areas and international axes

If most of the axes of entry of migrants to France are located in the Alpes-Maritimes, "which concentrate two thirds of non-admissions in 2022", according to the DGPN, the strengthening of controls "extends nevertheless to several departments with mountain areas and the various major international axes".

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The system, led by the border police (PAF), includes public security, law enforcement (CRS and mobile gendarmes) and departmental gendarmes.

It must be complete by Sunday and is "separate from the police mobilized to ensure the security and escorts of migrants from the Ocean Viking", according to the DGPN.

After three weeks of wandering in vain in search of a safe port in Italy, the humanitarian ship Ocean Viking, carrying 230 migrants, arrived Friday morning at the dock at the Toulon naval base, according to the maritime prefecture.