Will the famous Roxham Road return to blending into the countryside like before? This morning, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) demolished its last building on this road which crosses the border between Quebec and the United States.
On March 24, Ottawa and Washington made public a new protocol on the common border, a few hours before its actual entry into force, scheduled for midnight the same night. Under this protocol, the Agreement now applies to the entire border. A person who passes through an irregular entry route to seek asylum, including Roxham Road, can therefore be returned to the United States, which was not the case previously.
The number of people intercepted by the RCMP in Roxham then dropped dramatically, from more than 4,000 in March to 69 in April. Nationwide, the number of asylum seekers in 2023 is nevertheless on track to surpass last year’s record, if the trend continues. They now go through airports, a regular route, to submit their request.
However, as crossings at Roxham Road have decreased significantly, the infrastructure has become useless over the months. The RCMP therefore marked the occasion Monday morning and invited all the media to witness the start of demolition work on the last building. A sheet metal building approximately 4 meters wide by 10 meters long, which appeared in many photos of Roxham Road because it was the first reception and control post.
The RCMP had already started to pack up last May, but certain structures still remained.
Historical
Roxham Road came to public attention in 2017 as arrivals of applicants began to accelerate. A temporary accommodation center was then organized at the Olympic Stadium in August of the same year. The Canadian Armed Forces had also erected around a hundred tents in the area around the official border post of Saint-Bernard-de-Lacolle. In total, 18,836 people were intercepted by the RCMP that year, most of them crossing via this irregular route.
The RCMP then gradually took over, because it is this national police force that is primarily responsible for patrolling the border. With these crossings, the country road had become a semi-permanent post over time and tenders. Some buildings were erected and trailers installed. They were not used to stem the flow or deter asylum seekers, but rather to organize arrivals to complete certain formalities.
A gateway to Canada for more than 113,000 people since 2017, the place has often proven to be the last step to take after a long and perilous road across the Americas, particularly for tens of thousands of Haitians. The most represented countries of origin will also have been in order of importance: Nigeria, Turkey, Colombia, Congo, Afghanistan and Venezuela.
The border after Roxham
Ottawa admitted in April in an official document that the changes impose “challenges” on the RCMP, as well as local police. “Regulatory changes could, however, place pressure on RCMP resources,” it was written in The Canada Gazettebecause of the new migratory routes that could appear.
It then read: “It will be difficult for the RCMP to systematically apply the Regulations given the extent and relief of the Canadian landscape, the challenges posed by Indigenous and private lands, as well as the limitations of existing technological means to boundary (e.g. sensors and cameras). »
Questioned by the Duty, the RCMP had not disclosed the number of people deployed to the border. “The RCMP continually reviews its operational priorities to ensure that sectors are provided with the necessary resources,” said Corporal Tasha Adams.
The patience of Roxham’s neighbors has been sorely tested during the almost six years when this path was most traveled by people seeking protection from Canada. It was not uncommon to see some owners of houses along the road quickly asking the media not to park on their land.
During the expansion of the Safe Third Country Agreement last March, neighbors of the border had confided to the Duty fear that crossings will increase elsewhere on the border. “Before, the more we felt that Roxham Road was getting organized, the less we felt the presence of the RCMP. […] People went directly there,” recounted Évelyne Bouchard, who lives in Hemmingford backing on the border.
A few days after the Entente tightened, his family saw the RCMP escorting two adults and two children who had just attempted to cross through the forest. “It was completely surreal. People who live in very difficult conditions close to us and who appear in our lives. The contrast shocked us a lot,” she then expressed.
Further details will follow.