MIGRANTS NOW TAKE ON ALPS.
AMID BORDER CRACKDOWN, ILL-PREPARED AFRICANS NEGOTIATE SNOWY PASSES
As night fell, JeanGabriel Ravary trudged through thick snow up the mountain pass of Col de l’Echelle separating France from Italy.
After 42 years as a mountain guide, the 66-year-old could walk these Alps in his sleep. Yet even he carefully skirted two avalanche corridors, leaving the comfort of dogsled tracks to head into virgin snow.
Past a plaque in memory of wartime resistance fighters who held this pass against the Italians, a tiny chapel emerged in the light cast by the headlamp. Dedicated to Our Lady of Bonrencontre, protector of travellers, it was once a refuge from bandits. Today, it offers respite for a different type of unexpected visitor: migrants from sub-Saharan Africa.
After France reinstated border controls with Italy in the wake of the Paris 2015 terror attacks, migrants sought to cross in the Ventimiglia-Menton area on the coast. But as police cracked down on the route last spring, the migrants moved north and started heading across this 1.5-kmlong pass.
Before the snows, it was a tough but manageable 14-km trek from Bardonecchia in Italy via two tunnels and steep, rocky slopes to reach the first village on the French side, Nevache, population 340.
“They saw the lights of the village from up above so came down and knocked on the door or window of the first houses they came across,” said Ravary. “We are all mountain folk here. We don’t ask questions, we take them in. Our duty is to save people. If we were sailors it would be the same.”
So while some villagers offer overnight shelter, others take turns patrolling the snowy pass after sunset for lost souls, carrying gloves and hot drinks to revive those strong enough to continue, and calling mountain rescue for those too weak to go on.
“We were in a moral dilemma,” said Bernard Liger, 82, a retired battalion commander who now runs a “humanitarian commando” to help the migrants. “If we did nothing, many would be lost; if we did something, people would say we were ‘opening the door.’ ”
He has sent a petition signed by 45,000 people to President Emmanuel Macron calling on him to prevent these mountains becoming “the peaks of shame.”
“After much discussion, we agreed that border security is not our problem, that’s for politicians and the police. Our job is to minimize the number of frozen bodies come spring,” he said.
That risk is very real. Everyone here knows the story of Mamadou Ba, a 29-year-old Malian. He had been working as a cheese vendor in Paris for three years but was refused reentry into France after renewing his stay permit in Italy.
Among the first to attempt the winter crossing, he and a Guinean companion got lost in a snowstorm and spent the night in a snow-filled ravine. Halfdead, he managed to drag himself back up the slope and was saved by a passing woman who carried him down the mountain on her dogsled.
Ba lost the front half of both feet to frostbite, while his companion lost both hands. His bedroom window in nearby Briancon offers a sweeping view of the snowy peaks, but he keeps his curtains shut.
“If I see the snow it takes me back to that terrible night of suffering,” he said. “Africans don’t know anything about snow. They think it’s fun and have no idea it can kill. If they knew, they wouldn’t come.”
Yann Fillet, casualty chief at Briancon hospital, has treated more than 300 migrants in the past year.
“Two weeks ago, I picked up a guy who had walked half an hour in the snow barefoot at minus 15,” he said. “These people are incredible hardy. Only the strongest make it this far,” he said.
At Montgenevre, a ski resort straddling the FrenchItalian border, I witnessed eight migrants bolting across ski slopes after nightfall in a cat-and-mouse game with border forces. The frozen youths from Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Guinea, Mali, and Senegal eluded a police post to hide behind a ski lift on French soil.
A few hundred metres down the road, gendarmes lay in wait in a patrol car. But help was at hand. Volunteers alerted to the men’s arrival sent scouts to survey the police patrol while others handed out soup and gloves to the shivering young men, ordering them to stay hidden.
Belying appearances, all but two said they were minors — a claim impossible to verify as none had papers. In theory, French law obliges authorities either to hand foreign minors to Italy, or, if the Italians refuse, to take them in while they verify their claims. They should also properly consider asylum seekers’ requests.
The police patrol car finally drove away and the coast was clear. The eight migrants were driven to an emergency housing centre in central Briancon, opened by the town’s left-wing mayor and run by volunteers. Here, the men were offered hot foot baths and food, clothing and a bed for the night.
While gendarmes leave them in peace at the centre, they run the risk of being sent back to Italy if caught downtown.
As they warmed up, Sicard said: “When they reach Briancon, they think they’ve made it, they’ve won. But many will be thrown out. What awaits them is much harsher than they imagine.”
Two days later, all the young men had left the centre. Another dozen had taken their place.
AFRICANS HAVE NO IDEA (SNOW) CAN KILL. IF THEY KNEW, THEY WOULDN’T COME.