Several elected officials from the Grand Est, including the president (LR) of the region Jean Rottner, denounced this Sunday the "
brutality
" of the Berlin decision which intends to strengthen controls at the French border in the face of the proliferation of variants of the Covid-19 in Moselle.
Read also: Covid-19: do population flows at the borders promote the spread of the virus?
"
We were surprised at both the suddenness and the brutality
" of this decision, said Jean Rottner, interviewed by AFP.
For weeks, "
we have been trying to build something new at the level of a European cooperation area and we are being caught up by a position which is rather a central German position
", he lamented.
"
The Moselle figures today are stable
" even if "
it is far above what Germany accepts
" with "
a very high prevalence, more than 300 cases per 100,000 inhabitants
", has t he recognized.
"
But things are rather under control
", insisted the president of the Grand Est region.
"
I fully understand the concerns of Germany
", however added Jean Rottner who considers them "
legitimate
" even if he considers that "
things could perhaps have been managed even differently for some time
".
Be that as it may, he continued, "
there should be no queues at customs posts
" which some 16,000 border workers cross every day, but rather "
more in-depth, regular checks, possibly mixed Franco-German patrols
”.
"
The priority is the cross-border workers
"
"
This decision was taken in a rather brutal and rather unexpected way
", added to AFP the deputy of Moselle (LREM) Christophe Arend.
"
With my German counterpart, co-president of the bureau of the Franco-German Parliamentary Assembly, we asked our respective State Secretaries for European Affairs to convene on Monday an extraordinary cross-border cooperation committee
", he said. indicated.
According to him, "
we must clarify the situation and agree on the possibility of doing antigen testing and not just PCR tests
" to authorize border crossings.
The MEP underlined the potential consequences of the Berlin decision for pupils and students of the two countries who “have
to cross this border on a daily basis
”.
For the deputy (LREM) of Moselle Hélène Zannier also, “
the priority, it is the border ones
”.
"
What surprised, in the decision of Berlin, it is its suddenness, even if there were noises and if we were already attentive
", she noted in the same way.