Behind Boris Johnson’s suggestion, after drowning in the strait, France Not enough has been done to prevent small boats from crossing the border. This is a more complicated picture. Charities and the French political class are increasingly aware that security, safety and repression alone cannot solve the problem of refugees risking their lives to seek asylum in the UK.
In the past year, as the number of boats trying to cross the dangerous waterways of the English Channel has increased, police and patrols on the French coast have increased significantly, equipped with new surveillance equipment, reservists, and more than 600 police and military police working 24 hours a day— — Increasingly working at night — patrolling the 40-mile-long rugged coast. British financing has contributed to the increase in new technologies and the number of officers. In addition, asylum-seekers sleeping on the streets moved every night, tents and sleeping bags were confiscated, and camps were demolished.
Asylum seekers who traveled by boat in the past 18 months described the presence of powerful police on the beach and often tried to prevent people from disembarking.
An Iranian refugee who went to the UK at the end of last year said that he had tried to leave by boat three times, but was stopped by the French police each time. Subsequently, his team managed to avoid the attention of the police before successfully leaving on the fourth attempt. Once, the police came because they heard passengers screaming and requesting to disembark because they reconsidered the quality of the ship they were asked to ride. In the second and third attempts, the police arrived with torches and confiscated them before the ships could be launched. “We are not detained by the police, they will only let us leave the beach and go back to the jungle and follow us for a while to make sure we really leave,” the refugee said.
Pictures on the front pages of some British newspapers this week seem to show that a French police car was parked on a French beach while an immigrant boat entered the sea, which increased the insistence of British politicians that maintaining law and order is crucial. A reporter on the ground said that when a woman and a child stepped into the path of the patrol car, the patrol car appeared to try to prevent the boat from leaving.
France stated that its forces have prevented 65% of cross-border attempts in recent months, higher than 50%. French opposition politicians are increasingly concerned about issues beyond the security crackdown, and demand to review the asylum policy and renegotiate the 2003 Le Touquet agreement, which effectively placed the British border on the French side of the English Channel. French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin suggested on Thursday that Britain should first examine its labor market and employers who hire illegal workers.
Nicolas Laroye worked for the French border police on the northern coast for 12 years, as an officer in Dunkirk for 20 years, and was a union officer of the UNSA police union on boat issues. He said: “This is a 60-kilometer-long coastline that stretches to the Belgian border. Patrol is very difficult because the beach is bordered by a large number of sand dunes. People can hide at night and will appear once the patrol is over. The only real solution is in The entire coastline has been cordoned off, but this is of course impossible. In the past year, resources and French-British cooperation have increased significantly: 4×4 cars, night vision binoculars and thermal binoculars kits, and entry as reserve personnel Retired military officer.” He said: “When you see my colleagues wading into shallow water to save women, children and young people-many lives have been saved-this week’s death is catastrophic of.”
Olivier Cahn, professor of law and criminal science at the University of Sergis in Paris, spent 20 years studying border issues and cooperation between French and British police. An illusion. For 20 years, all that has been done is to increase the tolls for traffickers.”
He said that the United Kingdom and France’s joint security crackdown on the use of fences and police to blockade Calais ports and tunnels is “similar to protecting a nuclear air base” in response to truck crossings, prompting people to try to make more dangerous crossings in small boats. Last few years.
