NarrativeThe order fell from above. At the end of 2020, Emmanuel Macron announced the closure of around fifteen crossing points between France and Spain. Overnight, the daily life of the inhabitants of the Pyrenees is turned upside down by a decision that reveals the growing gap between the capital and certain territories.
It’s a tiny story. A closed road pass on the borders of the French Pyrenees for months without anyone understanding a thing. Neither the French nor the Spaniards of the surrounding villages, not even the elected officials and the police responsible for enforcing this closure. The story of this “bad decision” which complicated the lives of thousands of people for thirteen months, begins in the fall of 2020.
The newspapers remember Emmanuel Macron’s visit to Perthus, the border post of the Pyrénées-Orientales, a department that has for some years become the preferred route for migrants from Morocco, Algeria and sub-Saharan Africa. Under a bright sun, unusual on November 5, the President of the Republic, a black mask on his face, then announced a temporary closure of the French borders on a scale never seen since the creation of the Schengen area in 1985: about fifteen crossing points, located all along the 650 km border between France and Spain, would now be blocked.
The official objective, according to the authorities, being “to very strongly intensify border controls” pour “fight against the terrorist threat, the fight against trafficking and smuggling (drugs, cigarettes, alcohol, etc.) but also against illegal immigration”. It is up to the prefects concerned to organize themselves. They had two months.
A “grotesque” measure
January 6, 2021. Far from Le Perthus, some 300 kilometers away, it is 8 p.m. when the first cars are turned back to the Col du Portillon, one of the crossing points affected by this measure. That day, however, there was no more snow than usual. The border is closed until further notice, announce the gendarmes. Fight against terrorism. The repressed are skeptical. And worried. The last time we snubbed them like that was the day after the attack on Charlie Hebdo, when, as everywhere, border controls had been tightened. Would it start again? On the radio and on television, however, we only speak of the assault on the Capitol, in Washington, by hundreds of excited Trumpists, not of an attack in France.
“It doesn’t seem like much, but twice fifty minutes instead of twice fifteen minutes, it changes your day. » Michel, retired
As there are not thirty-six ways to materialize a border, Etienne Guyot, the prefect of the Occitanie and Haute-Garonne region, had large reinforced concrete blocks installed and as many border police officers (PAF) across this road which links Bagnères-de-Luchon to the Spanish town of Bossòst, located in the Val d’Aran. After a few days, because the plots were too far apart, the agents had piles of gravel and earth added to prevent the passage of motorcycles and bicycles. But the two-wheelers liked to climb the small pebbles. Large rocks have therefore come to complete the installation.
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