French authorities block train links as Italian protest over border controls

Ventimiglia has become the frontier in a battle over Tunisian migration into France

The French train operator SNCF cut Sunday services between Menton and Ventimiglia in a bid to beat a protest event organised to fight France’s clampdown on the number of Tunisians entering the country since the Jasmine Revolution in January.

Between 60 and 100 Tunisian migrants and human rights activists had planned to travel from Genoa to Marseille on a symbolic ‘dignity train’.

When the convoy arrived in Ventimiglia around 12.30pm they were barred from boarding the next train, which was to take them across the frontier. SNCF, under the orders of outgoing prefect Francis Lamy, then effectively closed the border and stopped all services to and from Ventimiglia. Passengers travelling towards Italy were told that a cross-border link had been suspended "due to a demonstration".

Lamy released a statement at around 7.10pm last night that claimed the decision to suspend services had been made to eliminate "the serious risk of trouble to public order". Trans-frontier services were resumed shortly afterwards at 7.30pm.

The French interior ministry released a statement denying that they had blocked off the border. However in Rome, the Italian foreign minister Franco Frattini criticised the French authorities suggesting that they had broken the Schengen agreement that implements an open border policy inside 25 European countries.

France has become the first Schengen country to set up an internal border patrol since the accords were signed in 1985.

A spokesperson for the EU Home Affairs Commissioner, Cecilia Malmstrom, told the Italian news agency AGI that no objection had yet been raised by Rome over the French authorities’ control policies. However the subject of North African migration has been hotly disputed amongst the European Union members.

However, with the Roma deportation scandal, which placed the legality of French immigration policy under considerable scrutiny last summer, still fresh in their minds, it is unlikely that the EU will be able to remain silent on this subject for much longer.

TD