One of Europe’s flagship projects is faltering. The passport-free Schengen area is under a continued assault from a growing number of countries that maintain or have re-introduced internal border checks, citing migration or terrorism worries.
It’s not technically correct since there’s no controls at the border with Monaco (I think), but France does officially informed the EU that it has temporary controls at all other borders until the end of October.
New terrorist threats, increasing risk of terrorist organisations present on national territory targeting the Rugby World Cup taking place in September and October 2023, increase in irregular entry flows at the external borders (from the Central Mediterranean and the Western Balkans); internal borders with Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Spain
France
01/05/2023 - 31/10/2023
New terrorist threats, increasing risk of terrorist organisations present on national territory targeting the Rugby World Cup taking place in September and October 2023, increase in irregular entry flows at the external borders (from the Central Mediterranean and the Western Balkans); internal borders with Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Spain
The article says “installed border checks”, not “walled off the entire border”. The article gives no quantification given how many checks there actually are. You can only infer that there’s at least one for every border.
With EU border it’s always clear that you can cross the border if you want to. E.g. Denmark - until recently - checked me every time I drove across the border, but if I wanted to, I could have stopped kilometer off, and just walked. They didn’t control foot traffic and the border fence is specifically designed to be easy to cross for humans (but not boars).
Haven’t seen any border control either and we cross several borders between Belgium, France, Germany and Austria each year. The only border control I’ve ever seen is in Basel, Switzerland, and even that is never a big deal, they have never actually stopped us.
This is patently untrue.
What else is this article lying about?
It’s not technically correct since there’s no controls at the border with Monaco (I think), but France does officially informed the EU that it has temporary controls at all other borders until the end of October.
https://home-affairs.ec.europa.eu/policies/schengen-borders-and-visa/schengen-area/temporary-reintroduction-border-control_en
Says they are here as well
https://www.fragomen.com/insights/european-unionschengen-area-internal-schengen-border-checks-further-extended.html
EU source:
France 01/05/2023 - 31/10/2023 New terrorist threats, increasing risk of terrorist organisations present on national territory targeting the Rugby World Cup taking place in September and October 2023, increase in irregular entry flows at the external borders (from the Central Mediterranean and the Western Balkans); internal borders with Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Spain
https://home-affairs.ec.europa.eu/policies/schengen-borders-and-visa/schengen-area/temporary-reintroduction-border-control_en
Except I’ve crossed the border with Belgium and Luxemburg five times in total since May and I have seen no controls.
Has anyone?
The article says “installed border checks”, not “walled off the entire border”. The article gives no quantification given how many checks there actually are. You can only infer that there’s at least one for every border.
With EU border it’s always clear that you can cross the border if you want to. E.g. Denmark - until recently - checked me every time I drove across the border, but if I wanted to, I could have stopped kilometer off, and just walked. They didn’t control foot traffic and the border fence is specifically designed to be easy to cross for humans (but not boars).
Haven’t seen any border control either and we cross several borders between Belgium, France, Germany and Austria each year. The only border control I’ve ever seen is in Basel, Switzerland, and even that is never a big deal, they have never actually stopped us.