Refugees living in northern France say that Brexit has made it easier for them to reach the UK by boat, as the number of people crossing the English Channel in a single day set a record.
According to the Home Office, despite worsening weather conditions and the British government’s attempts to stop them, 1,185 people crossed on Thursday.
Refugees fleeing various conflict zones including Sudan, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and Eritrea told the Guardian that they believe that the UK is no longer part of the European Union, which makes venturing through dangerous border crossings more attractive because they It can no longer be sent back to other European countries in accordance with EU legislation.
October 2020 Boris Johnson says Brexit will enable the UK to regain “full control of our money, our borders and our laws”.
Nevertheless, although the total number of people fleeing the conflict and applying for asylum in the UK has dropped to 31,115 In the past 12 months, since the United Kingdom and the European Union parted ways, the number of people travelling by boat from France to the United Kingdom has risen sharply.
Previously, when the United Kingdom was part of the European Union, under a mechanism called Dublin, the United Kingdom could require other European Union countries to bring back people from European countries that they can prove that they have passed through a safe European country before arriving in the United Kingdom.
Thanks to the Eurodac fingerprint database, the UK can make a “responsible” request, and officials can usually prove that asylum seekers have passed through other countries.But due to Brexit The UK is no longer able to access the database, so it is more difficult to clearly prove which other European countries the boat that had arrived in the UK passed through.
So far, the UK has not reached any bilateral agreement with other EU countries to enable it to replicate the Dublin arrangement. Instead, officials marked many claims that they suspected that people had passed through other European countries before arriving in the UK as “unacceptable.”
In practice, this means that many asylum-seekers have been in trouble for a long time in the system, but have not been sent to other countries.
Even before Britain leaves the European Union, only a few hundred people will be sent to other European countries in 2020.
The Guardian recently interviewed dozens of asylum seekers in northern France. Many people are malnourished, ragged and desperate, and have fled various conflict areas. Some people have traveled in Libya, where they were detained and trafficked.
A 19-year-old man from Sudan who is currently in Calais said: “We believe that unless we can reach the UK, we will not be safe. Here, the French police beat us every day and drive us out of sleep. Place. This reminds me of the bad memories of Libya, where I was locked up by human traffickers and beaten many times. Because of Brexit, I believe that once I arrive in the UK, I will eventually be safe. No Dublin, no fingerprints.”
He said he did not have the money to pay the smugglers, and he would try to cross the river in an abandoned kayak with a small group of friends. “Every night, we will go to the beach to find the abandoned boat, and we will try to cross that road.”
A Kurdish man calling himself Navid was sleeping in a tent in Dunkirk. He said his family had reached an agreement with the smugglers to pay for his boat crossing.
“Everyone here tells me that it is easier to find a sense of security in the UK because of Brexit,” he said. “I hope I can manage to tide over the storm without losing my life and find a safe future in the UK.”
