Ottawa has wanted to close Roxham Road “for several years,” Justin Trudeau said Wednesday, noting that “Quebecians have been extremely generous in welcoming and accepting” asylum seekers.
“The question isn’t should we close it, the question is how do we close it? Because putting up barricades on Roxham Road will, quite simply, make people cross the six thousand kilometers of border that we have with the United States elsewhere,” the prime minister said during a brief media presence in Richmond Hill, Ontario.
Mr Trudeau is ensuring that the solution lies in renegotiating the safe third country agreement with our southern neighbours.
Canada, he says, is making “progress” on this front.
“But until then, we must continue to be true to our values and international agreements to welcome migrants, but we must also continue to be there for Quebecers who have been extremely generous in welcoming and welcoming in particular those people who have crossed the border” , continued the Prime Minister.
Pressure on the federal government has mounted in recent days as the influx of asylum seekers begins crossing Quebec’s borders.
Prime Minister François Legault earlier this week sent a letter to Justin Trudeau urging him, among other things, to make Roxham Road a priority when he meets Joe Biden in Ottawa in a few weeks.
Furthermore, Mr Trudeau implied that Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre would like to “build a wall on Roxham Road” but that the 6,000 kilometers of “unsecured border” made that impossible.
He replied to Mr Poilievre, who called on the government to close Roxham Road within the next month.
“A country with borders. The Prime Minister is responsible for the borders and he should close Roxham Road within 30 days,” Mr Poilievre said in an impromptu press conference in Parliament on Tuesday. He did not mention building a wall.
In a written statement, Bloc Québécois President Yves-François Blanchet reiterated that “Quebec has done more on a humanitarian level than it had to.”
“The provinces that agree to do more are raising concerns comparable to Quebec’s, and it doesn’t seem to occur to anyone to accuse them of doing so, accompanied by accusations of xenophobia,” he said.