“I am not paid to go to work with fear in my stomach, we have the impression that the Indian variant worries the planet but not France!
“At the end of the line, Friday evening, the concern of this employee of the Red Cross is palpable.
The association, mandated to intervene with foreigners in the waiting area at Roissy-Charles-de-Gaulle airport (Val-d'Oise), has asserted its right of withdrawal.
The "Zapi", as it is also called, is an area away from the airport runways, marked with a few signs.
Foreigners who cannot prove that they have entered France properly or that they have continued their journey are kept there for a maximum of twenty days.
During this period, a judge of freedoms and detention rules, within a maximum period of eight days, on requests for extension from the Ministry of the Interior.
Foreigners can be released or re-routed to the country where they flew, if they do not refuse to board.
With the third wave of Covid and the psychosis of variants, the promiscuity of 120 people (for a maximum capacity of 150), including several dozen Indian nationals, concern is at its height.
Dreams of America
“This is a completely new situation. In eight years, I have never seen anything like it: the Zapi filled to this point and the Red Cross which is withdrawing ”, testifies Me Sonia Boundaoui, lawyer at the bar of Seine-Saint-Denis. On Friday, the hearing ended overnight. It was unheard of: 52 cases, including many Indian nationals, many of whom left Punjab, with dreams of America in mind.
Never before had so many Indian nationals been registered in Zapi.
“They generally have an authentic passport and seek to go to the United States, via Mexico and El Salvador, and encounter, when they arrive in transit at Roissy, from Moscow or Dakar, with denied boarding, opposed by the airline or foreign authorities.
The pandemic and the reorganization of air flows certainly explain this novelty, ”decrypts Philippe Damulot, first vice-president of freedoms and detention at the Bobigny judicial court.
The rule is clear: if a passenger is turned away on arrival, it is up to the company that transported him on the outward journey to ensure the return.
"Sanitary time bomb"
These Indians are mostly adults, sometimes in couples with young children, and unwilling to perform a PCR test. Because for a foreigner on borrowed time, a negative test is not just good news. It can also be compared to a green light to get back on the plane, with a return to square one. Screening is not just a health issue. “The smugglers tell them to refuse the tests! ", Worries a speaker, who fears a" sanitary time bomb ". State of emergency or not, today no one can be forced to take a PCR test.
Obviously, the concern about sanitary conditions in Zapi has redoubled with the appearance of variants, more contagious and at the origin of even more severe forms. This is evidenced by the case of a Moroccan national who arrived from Brazil whose contamination with Covid was only known late. "It was only at the hearing before the judge of freedoms and detention that his positive PCR test was produced by the police officers of the PAF!" », Regrets another lawyer. While a few hours earlier, barely, another lawyer had spoken, without knowing it, in a small room without a window ... The Seine-Saint-Denis bar had also asserted its right of withdrawal for four days . The organization has since been adjusted. Although a medical permanence takes place on site,many here doubt the application of the government maxim: "Trace, isolate, protect".
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Beyond cluster fears, there is also the question of leavers, without knowing whether they are Covid carriers or not.
Eighteen of the fifty-two people who appeared before the judge on Friday have been released.
The others have returned to the waiting zone, and will shortly return to the JLD if the Interior Ministry wishes to extend their stay in Zapi.
Where did those who were released go?
None of our interlocutors know it, even if some suppose that they have drop-off points in France.
The refusals to extend the stay in the waiting zone do not date from the Covid pandemic, recalls magistrate Philippe Damulot.
“These refusals are often linked to questions of procedure or the conditions for exercising rights.
They are not motivated by health issues apart from very specific and very rare individual cases, ”explains the judge.
The prefecture can issue isolation orders.
In any case, none were taken on Friday.
Now, only the PAF police are present at Zapi, where, according to our information, around a hundred people were held on Saturday.
At the time of publication of this article, the police have not asserted a right of withdrawal.
Our questions to the border police, the Ministry of the Interior and the regional health agency (ARS) have remained unanswered.