Border guard, a job that appeals to the port of Sète

Les gardes-frontières sont supervisés par les policiers spécialisés. Hélène Amiraux

Neuf gardes-frontières ont rejoint depuis quelques mois la Police aux frontières de Sète.

Over the past year and the Rugby World Cup, a new system has appeared in the shelters: the GFPSP, border guards with special status. There are nine in total within the UCT (Cross-border Control Unit) of Sète. These are contract workers trained at the PAF who intervene in shelters to verify identities and pass them to the police files before entering the national territory, under the supervision of a PAF police officer. .

Contractual workers trained by the PAF

"I visually check the identity, the validity date, then I pass it to the police files of wanted persons"< /em>, describes Alexandre, 24 years old, former municipal police officer in Valencia, trainee border guard since December.
These recruits are trained to identify anomalies in travel documents (support, information, ink, typography) depending on the countries concerned where the legislation changes very regularly. They learn to question travelers randomly.
"For minors, we make sure they are with their parents. We also look at the stamps to see where people have traveled before, he continues. Sète also has its own. But this symbol will soon disappear. "What we call composting of visas accumulated for professionals are sometimes completely illegible and complicates validity calculations. So it will be replaced by a computer procedure", specifies Akim, the leader of one of the two UCT brigades. Significant support in the shelter, knowing that the police have other tasks to ensure such as cargo control, temporary visas for sailors, drivers, cruise passengers or daily patrols to carry out throughout the port.< br /> Omar, 38, also chose to apply to become a border guard after seven years as a security guard at the port.