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CRACKDOWN ON STOWAWAYS NETS 150 MIGRANTS A NIGHT

LIVING IT ROUGH: Cherbourg

Thursday September 27,2007

By Nick Fagge in Cherbourg

Comment Speech Bubble Have your say(15)

RIOT police launched a crackdown last night on migrants in Cherbourg – which has become the front line in Britain’s war on illegal immigration.

Stowaways were pulled from under a lorry in the Normandy port as part of the operation to cut off this new route to the UK.

The men, who claimed to be from Iraq, were perched over a rear axle of the 36-ton truck. They had been hoping to get on to a ferry bound for Poole, Dorset.

Instead they joined the 150-odd immigrants arrested in Cherbourg every night. Home Office figures show 1,300 were stopped on this route in July alone.

“It’s a war and a very difficult one,” said Jean-Louis Fargeas, Prefect of the Le Manche district of France, which covers Calais. “We have deployed nightly patrols to deal with the situation but the problem goes on and on.”

The riot police accompanied Mr Fargeas as he inspected security at the passenger and cargo port, which runs regular services to and from Poole, Portsmouth and Southampton.

Within minutes of arriving, the police shone their torches under lorries queuing for a Brittany Ferries ship that takes up to 590 vehicles to England.

The captured men, in their early 20s, said they had boarded a lorry from Poland. They shouted a stream of obscenities and made rude gestures at police before being searched and taken away for questioning.

“They will be asked if they want to claim asylum in France. But so far no one arrested in Cherbourg has asked for sanctuary in France. They prefer to go to Britain. They say they want to go there to get rich,” said Mr Fargeas.

Police admit they have a particular problem with poorly paid Polish drivers, who risk £2,000 fines if found with immigrants on board.

Last week French trucker Thierry Troncon was fined £4,000 after three migrants were discovered in the back on his truck on his arrival in Poole from Cherbourg.

He said: “Security in Cherbourg is a joke. They climb on to your truck when you are waiting to get on the ferry to England.

And when they are discovered in Britain the driver is fined. It’s just not fair.” There are now so many would-be asylum seekers living rough in Cherbourg that the city’s legal department yesterday applied for a court order to destroy a makeshift refugee camp.

The camp, known locally as Quarry’s Edge, is on a stretch of industrial wasteland close to the port and is home to some 20 improvised shelters, made of plastic sheets and even bin liners.

They are set to be torn down this week, but the impending eviction has made the prospect of an official “welcome centre” more likely.

It has prompted fears of a “new Sangatte” – the Red Cross refugee camp near the entrance of the Channel Tunnel in Calais which attracted 67,000 immigrants before being closed in 2002.

Bernard Cazeneuve, mayor of Cherbourg, said a camp would ensure the migrants remained in one place where they could be policed properly. “Cherbourg is the best place to get to Britain,” said one migrant, who claimed to be a 19-year-old Iranian called Ali.

“Britain has been our destination from the day we left our home countries Most of us have travelled thousands of miles to come here because we were told it was an easy route to England.”

One of Ali’s travelling companions, a 36-year-old also from Iran, said: “Charities give us food each day, but we need proper accommodation here.

Fights sometimes break out between groups from different nationalities.” Pointing to a group of Iraqis living in tents in a different corner of the site, he said: “We never speak to them, and they never have anything to do with us.

The only thing we have in common is that we all want to get to England. We do not have visas or passports, but we will get across whatever the cost.” The “welcome centre” in Cherbourg could be running by Christmas and a new one is also planned for Calais.

Damien Green, the Conservative spokesman on immigration, said: “This is a very disturbing development.

“Anything that encourages large concentrations of migrants who may wish to get across the Channel is bad for our immigration controls and dangerous for the truck drivers whose lorries the migrants try to board.”

It’s a war and a very difficult one

THE FRONT LINE

28.09.07, 9:33pm

Firstly, my thanks and congratulations, to The Daily Express for allowing such a debate as this.
When we hear the that E.U. is promoting the importation of 20,000,000 ,yes, that figure is confirmed, to enter the E.U. as, the Mandarins say, we need to to boost our population because the indigenous people are not producing sufficient replacement, can one wonder why these people from all corners of the world wish to avail themselves of the "easy life?"
The problem, as far as we are concerned, is, why do they all want to come to Britain?
I think that the answer is self evident. We are a soft touch!
How can we, and by that I mean the people of these Islands of Great Britain, confront and confound this ENORMOUS threat to EVERYTHING we hold dear?
Everyone with half a dozen brain cells reading this KNOWS that our country, our society, our way of life, our history and our existence are being overwhelmed by this phenomena. I don't have to tell you that. But, what can be done to halt and then reverse this catastrophe?
It means, dear reader, a complete leap of faith. There will be an election shortly. The big beasts are shuffling into position. Think on this, I beg you.
"If you keep on doing what you've always done,
You'll always get What you'll always got!"
The three major Parties in this country share the same bed, the same clothes and the same policies!
Break out of the box and, given the chance, create a ripple on the pond, by saying, "I don't approve of what you lot have done for umpteen years. I don't think you speak for ME!" Then vote for the ONLY party that I have identified as being 100% on MY wavelength, The British National Party!
Don't approve?
Go to their website, read what they have to say, compare, contrast and then make your decision.

www.bnp.org.uk

• Posted by: BlackBuck • Report Comment

AND THEY WILL KEEP COMING...

28.09.07, 10:58am

and they will keep coming....for their benefit cheques..hospital treatment....top of the housing queue....absolute respect from the indigenous population,who will be called racists if they complain.
I have decided that I will not show any respect to someone who is stealing what should be mine.
If they come into my house and steal from me,I believe I have the right to complain..so if they come into my country and steal what should be mine I should have the right to be angry.

• Posted by: millieC • Report Comment

SHOW YOUR FRUSTRATION AT THE BALLOT BOX

28.09.07, 10:25am

We all know what is required, most of us agree on the problems and the solution but the reality is whilst those angry people out there continue to vote for Labour, the Tories or the Liberals nothing will change.

Anger is justified and natural but people need to back up this anger by putting a cross in the right box at the ballot, if they do not then they will have themselves to blame as we descend further into the mire.

• Posted by: Elgar1857 • Report Comment

MAKE THEM CLAIM ASSYLUM IN FRANCE

27.09.07, 8:50pm

assylum seekers who end up in france should be given assylum there ,photographed and fingerprinted,where they have camped if travelling to the uk should be returned to the first safe country that they have visited ,the uk must stop its policy of giving these people a free meal ticket ,by all means if the civil rights groups want to house them ,then all well and good, but why should the british public foot the bill when most of us are in debt to pay for houses etc.

• Posted by: crazyhorse • Report Comment

IMMIGRATION

27.09.07, 7:21pm

Does it matter at all what we are called?
probably already the laughing stock of the world,second class citizens in our own country,taken for a load of fools by all and sundry, name calling cannot do us any harm at all, unless we let it

• Posted by: Maggie • Report Comment

I AGREE MAGGIE

27.09.07, 7:15pm

I totally agree with you Maggie and so would most others - demonstrations do have an impact.

The problem with this problem is the Lib/Lab/Con alliance would have their supporters out as well saying we were "racists"; "Islamophobes"; "NAZIS" etc etc. The whole assylum and imigration issue has been silenced by the main partes and the Marxists and woe betide anyone who dare stand up for OUR RIGHTS as the indigenous people paying for all these new arrivals.

Sooner or later it will end in violence, bloodshed and protests but by then it would be too late and we will be the underdogs in our own country!

• Posted by: Robertocarlo • Report Comment