Latest news with #ChannelCrossings
Telegraph
7 hours ago
- Politics
- Telegraph
French police ‘will never stop us', say Channel migrants
Channel migrants have vowed that they will 'never give up' on trying to reach Britain despite a looming French crackdown on illegal crossings. French ministers are set to change maritime rules to allow border police, gendarmes and coastguard vessels to stop boats from leaving waters within 300 metres of their coastline. The new strategy will see 'taxi boats' packed with migrants intercepted in shallow waters off Channel beaches. It will probably mean that migrants trying to clamber aboard are pushed back onto dry land by officers armed with shields and batons. However, migrants told The Telegraph that they would 'never give up' trying to reach the UK on small boats. Young men, teenagers and families with small children said they would try to find a way through to Britain, whatever new methods were adopted by the French. Waiting at a makeshift migrant camp on the edge of Loon-Plage, near the port of Dunkirk, was Jamal, a 24-year-old Sudanese man. He had made the two-month journey from North Africa to northern France by any method he could, including boat and horseback. 'If the police stop us in the water when we try to reach the boats, then we will go back to the beach the next day or the next week,' he said. 'We'll never give up.' Ali, a 27-year-old nursing assistant from Afghanistan, had a similar message for the French and British governments. 'Me and my friends are seeking asylum. As Azeris, we cannot express our ethnic identity in Afghanistan since the Taliban took over. It is terrible,' he said. 'That is why I hope the British will give us asylum. That's why we travelled here from Afghanistan. 'I agree people shouldn't be able to cross illegally – only refugees who really need asylum should be protected.' Ali and Jamal, along with their fellow migrants at the Grand-Synthe camp, have faced a heavier than normal police presence on the beach at nearby Gravelines. The beach, which is more than 1,000 yards long, has been a favourite pick-up point for people-smugglers operating 'taxi boats' over the past week. But early morning, patrols of the sands and surrounding dunes by French riot police ensured that no migrant boats left Gravelines on Friday. From before dawn, foot patrols with powerful torches swept the dunes for migrants who might be hidden. As the sun rose, officers patrolled the surrounding paths and roads leading to the beach through holiday homes and children's playgrounds. Detritus left behind by migrants who had recently managed to board boats could be seen piled high on the edge of the beach – trainers, bags, clothes and some identity documents. There was even a crutch left behind by one migrant who was seen earlier in the week using his remaining crutch to clamber into a boat with the help of fellow passengers. There are signs at Gravelines and elsewhere that French police are taking a more interventionist approach in the migrant crisis, in response to criticism by the British Government. In the past week, migrants emerging from the dunes have been sprayed with tear gas. All vehicles approaching Gravelines beach were searched by early morning police patrols on Thursday, with officers checking for any signs of hidden migrants or inflatable boats. Police are also using drones and light aircraft to spot boats along a 75-mile stretch of coastline. At one stage, a patrol van could be seen parked next to a memorial honouring the sacrifice of French and British marines who took part in repeated attempts to reconnoitre German coastal defences in the run up to D-Day – an echo of previous Anglo-French co-operation. But migrant aid charities have warned that the French and British governments will have 'blood on their hands' if police adopt new tactics of intercepting migrants in the waters off the coast. In the past seven days, 2,066 people have crossed the Channel using 33 small boats, with traffickers taking advantage of good weather to make the crossing. Last Friday alone, 919 made the crossing using 14 boats. That was followed by 489 on Tuesday and 244 on Wednesday. On Thursday morning, six French coastguard vessels took part in the rescue of a small group of migrants whose overladen dinghy had run into difficulties mid-way across the Channel. The dinghy had set off unnoticed from a beach close to the port of Calais. The people on board were handed over to the British authorities after being plucked from their boat. A Home Office spokesman said: 'We all want to end dangerous small boat crossings, which threaten lives and undermine our border security. 'The people-smuggling gangs do not care if the vulnerable people they exploit live or die, as long as they pay, and we will stop at nothing to dismantle their business models and bring them to justice.'
The Sun
2 days ago
- Politics
- The Sun
Small boat migrant crosses Channel every 5 MINUTES in near-record week of arrivals
A WHOPPING 2,222 small boat migrants have arrived in the past week - equivalent to one every five minutes. The number of Channel crossings since Labour came to power today surpassed 40,000 after the highest seven-day period since 2021. 2 2 Ministers were challenged to declare the influx a public safety crisis after a proportion of grooming gang predators were found to be asylum seekers. On Tuesday 489 migrants made the perilous journey from French beaches in eight dinghies to continue a busy summer period of arrivals. Hapless Calais cops were again seen standing by as the migrants waded into the water to be picked up by smuggling gangs. Emmanuel Macron has pledged to change the law to let his officers intercept them in the shallows - but Nigel Farage yesterday warned the crisis would continue until Britain acted to reduce its pull factors. It came as Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood warned the European Convention of Human Rights must be overhauled to restore damaged public trust in the rule of law. Addressing the Council of Europe, she said there is a 'growing perception' that human rights rules are 'no longer a shield for the vulnerable, but a tool for criminals to avoid responsibility'. The Justice Secretary declared that the ECHR 'too often protects those who break the rules, rather than those who follow them'. In May nine countries led by Italy and Denmark wrote a public letter blasting the convention for too often 'protecting the wrong people'. The Council of Europe, which oversees the ECHR, has said it recognises a need to change. But in the meantime, ministers have vowed to get a grip over how domestic courts adopt bogus rulings from Strasbourg. Ms Mahmood said: 'If a foreign national commits a serious crime, they should expect to be removed from the country. 'In the UK, we are restoring the balance we pledged at the birth of our Convention: liberty with responsibility, individual rights with the public interest. There must be consequences for breaking the rules.' In January an Albanian criminal was allowed to stay in the UK because his son wouldn't eat international varieties of chicken nuggets. And just last month a Pakistani paedo avoided deportation after claiming he risks being attacked by 'religious fanatics' in his homeland. Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp accused the government of siding with 'foreign criminals and not the British public'. He slammed the ECHR for protecting sexual predators over the country's kids, blasting: 'Who is looking out for their rights? Not the Government.' The Shadow Home Secretary argued the UK should rip up the Human Rights Act when it comes to immigration matters.
Telegraph
2 days ago
- General
- Telegraph
French police fail to stop Channel migrant on crutches
French police failed to prevent a man using a crutch from getting into a migrant boat setting out across the Channel. The man, who leant heavily on the crutch, was one of several dozen people who boarded a dinghy off a stretch of beach near Calais It comes after Sir Keir Starmer admitted that the small-boats crisis is getting worse, and ahead of an expected surge in crossings due to warmer weather. Just after first light on Wednesday morning, the man with the crutch was among a group of migrants, marshalled by a trafficker wearing a mask, who made their way across the long sandy beach at Gravelines and into the shallow waters. French police were nowhere to be seen. His companions had helped him wade out to the boat and cries of encouragement could be heard as he climbed aboard the tiny, overladen dinghy. Unlike many of his fellow passengers, he was not wearing a lifejacket. The number of people arriving on small boats across the Channel so far this year is more than 22 per cent higher than it was by this time in 2024. From the beginning of Jan until June 14, 16,317 migrants crossed to the UK. Last year 13,489 had made the journey by the end of June. On Monday, another 228 people crossed in four boats, according to the latest Home Office figures. A further 134 people had managed to reach the UK on Saturday, in two small boats. On Friday, more than 900 migrants crossed in 14 boats – the single largest number for several weeks. Last Thursday, 52 reached the UK coast in one boat, and the day before 400 had made it across in six small boats. The crossing remains perilous. Since the beginning of the year at least 15 people have died at sea while attempting to cross the Channel, according to the French. In 2024, more than 78 migrants died while attempting to reach the UK. On Saturday, the French coastguard said they had rescued almost 100 people who had attempted the crossing on that day and the previous 24 hours. There has been growing frustration at France's apparent foot-dragging, with it stopping fewer than 40 per cent of boats so far this year. It marks the lowest proportion on record despite a three-year Anglo-French deal costing £480 million to combat the crossings. But France's interior ministry has pledged to come up with a new strategy by the time of Franco-British summit – which begins on July 8 – involving police and gendarmes intercepting migrant boats at sea up to 300 metres from the coast for the first time. Matthew Pennycook, a Labour minister, said the reform was part of a series of changes which he said would allow the UK to cut the number of economic migrants and asylum seekers reaching its shores. French police have already begun to adopt more robust tactics, including dousing beaches with tear gas, to try to stop so many small boats leaving northern France. They are also using drones to spot boats along a 75-mile stretch of coastline, which is policed by hundreds of officers. At Gravelines on Wednesday, police officers appeared to be focusing their efforts further inland in a bid to deter migrants from even reaching the beach. The French authorities claim two-thirds of vessels are already being prevented from leaving. The promised crackdown comes as conditions in the migrant camps in northern France appeared to be deteriorating, with rising tensions among those desperate to leave. Two migrants were shot dead in two separate incidents at camps near the town of Dunkirk on Saturday and Sunday, with around five others wounded. All those involved were reported to be of Sudanese origin. French police said that one migrant was shot and killed at a camp at Loon Plage, outside Dunkirk, on Sunday. The shooting came a day after gunfire killed another man in the same area the previous day and left five others wounded. Armed officers arrested two suspected members of an organised gang on Saturday in connection with one of the shootings. A 29-year-old man who claimed to be from Iraq was held, along with a 16-year-old from Afghanistan, the public prosecutor's office said. Salomé Bahri, a volunteer with Utopia 56, a group working with migrants based near Grande-Synthe, site of a large migrant camp outside Dunkirk, told the InfoMigrants news website that there had been 'a lot of tensions in the area . . . in the last two or three weeks'. She said the situation had worsened because of the authorities' attempt to clear out the camps. One, near Loon Plage, is currently home to between 1,500 to 2,000 people, an increase from around 1,000 last winter. 'The tensions are also caused by the trafficking gangs,' said another volunteer. 'You can't say that all the migrants there are causing these tensions. But everything that is happening there, all this violence is also a consequence of the migration policies being carried out at the border.'
Telegraph
2 days ago
- Politics
- Telegraph
People smugglers offer half price summer discount to cross Channel
People smugglers have halved their prices for migrants to try to cash in on the summer heatwave. Albanian crime gangs are offering Channel crossings for just £2,000 per person, the lowest price since 2002, partly in an attempt to lure their countrymen back to small boats as a route to the UK. The number of Albanians crossing the Channel has slumped from 12,658 in 2022, when they were the biggest nationality, to just 630 last year after the implementation of a fast-track deportation agreement with the UK. It reflects a price war amongst people smugglers offering summer discounts amid evidence that their profits are being hit by law enforcement disrupting supply chains and intercepting boats and equipment. The lower prices are thought to be behind the increase in the number of poorer migrants now making the journey. Eritreans, who are among the poorest asylum seekers, were the most common nationality arriving by small boat in the three months to June, accounting for one in five or 1,291 of the arrivals. It follows the disclosure in March that the crime gangs are offering migrants cheaper crossings if they agree to be filmed so smugglers can then use the videos to promote their services on social media. The hot weather and calm seas have seen 1,733 migrants reach the UK in small boats in the past week, including 919 last Friday, the second highest daily total this year. Some 16,317 migrants have crossed the Channel so far this year, up more than 40 per cent higher than at the same point last year and the record for any year since the first Channel arrivals in 2018. Downing Street admitted on Tuesday that the Channel crisis was 'deteriorating' but is hoping that a change in tactics by the French due to be implemented in two weeks' time will stem the surge. As first revealed by The Telegraph earlier this month, the French interior ministry has authorised police for the first time to intercept the people smugglers' 'taxi boats' and migrants at sea within 300 metres of the boats in an attempt to prevent them leaving for the UK. Until now, the French have refused to intervene in the water because they claim maritime laws prevent them from taking action that could put lives at sea at risk. But the French government has given the green light to do so while 'respecting' the 'law of the sea'. The latest discounted price has been advertised in a public Facebook group called 'Pune ne Angli' ('Work in England'), which is aimed at Albanians and has more than 17,000 followers. 'We have a journey on a small boat. Only £2000,' it says. 'The fall in price is due to a sharp decline in interest from Albanians using small boats. This is the cheapest offer ever, clearly aimed at attracting new clients. Last year, only 630 Albanians made the journey compared to 940 in 2023,' said an Albanian immigration expert. 'Albanians are now avoiding small boat crossings, knowing they will be processed by the Home Office in Dover and likely sent to detention centres, with the aim of deportation.' In the year to March, Afghans were the most common nationality arriving by small boat with 5,766 arrivals, two per cent up on the previous year. Syrians were the second highest nationality although the fall of the Assad regime has seen their numbers plummet in the most recent quarter, constituting just five per cent of arrivals. Eritrea was the third highest nationality arriving by small boat in the year ending March 2025, with 4,229 arrivals, an increase of 47 per cent on the previous year. There has been growing frustration at the apparent foot dragging by the French who so far this year have stopped fewer than 40 per cent of the boats, the lowest proportion on record, despite a three-year £480 million Anglo-French deal to combat the crossings. Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, wants French border police and gendarmes to intercept the taxi boats not only in the shallow waters as they leave the beaches but also when they make their way from rivers and inland waterways to pick up the migrants. The French interior ministry told The Telegraph earlier this month that it will change its tactics 'so that we can operate in shallow waters, up to 300 metres from the coast, and thus intercept 'taxi boats', while respecting the principles of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, known as the Montego Bay Convention.' It aims to have 'shared guidelines' on the strategy ready for the Anglo-French summit, which starts on July 8, when Emmanuel Macron, the French president, will travel to London for a state visit.
Reuters
2 days ago
- Politics
- Reuters
France aims to intercept UK-bound migrant boats offshore as Channel crossings surge
PARIS, June 18 (Reuters) - Faced with a growing number of Channel migrant crossings, France hopes to stop more small boats from reaching Britain by changing its rules of engagement to intercept vessels, France's interior ministry has said. France and Britain hope to unveil the measures at next month's U.K.-France Summit, according to a French interior ministry document seen by Reuters. The number of migrants arriving in the UK via the Channel had risen by 42% this year compared with 2024 due to favourable weather conditions, and new techniques to pack boats more tightly, France's interior ministry said. French authorities are currently only able to save migrants if they encounter life-threatening danger at sea. The change in rules would allow authorities to intercept small boats up to 300 metres from shore. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer's office said in a statement after meeting French President Emmanuel Macron in Canada this week that migration should be a key focus at the July summit given the deteriorating situation in the Channel. Ahead of the summit, Macron will be in Britain for a state visit, during which he will meet with King Charles. Ties between France and Britain have improved since Starmer took office last year, brought closer by shared concerns over Russian aggression toward Ukraine and the need to re-arm Europe as U.S. President Donald Trump plots a more isolationist position for the world's largest economy.
