World News | UK Military Asked to Help Stem Channel Migrant Crossings
Get latest articles and stories on World at LatestLY. Britain's military said Saturday it has been asked by the government to help prevent people from reaching the U.K. from France in small boats, after a surge in the number of vessels making the dangerous journey.
London, Aug 8 (AP) Britain's military said Saturday it has been asked by the government to help prevent people from reaching the U.K. from France in small boats, after a surge in the number of vessels making the dangerous journey.
The Ministry of Defense said it had received a request from the Home Office to "support UK Border Force operations in the Dover Straits.”
The department said it was “working hard to identify how we can most effectively assist.” Britain's Conservative government has talked tough after dozens of crossings by migrants during recent weeks of warm summer weather.
On Thursday, 235 people landed or were brought ashore from boats in the English Channel, a record number for a single day. Britain's Coastguard said it was responding to “a number of incidents” in the Channel on Saturday.
Home Secretary Priti Patel has said the Royal Navy could be called in to prevent boats reaching UK waters, though other senior officials and politicians say that could be impractical and potentially dangerous.
Jack Straw, who served as Home Secretary during a previous Labour government, said “it will only take one of these dinghies to capsize and everybody to drown … for there to be a hullabaloo, including in the Conservative Party, and for the policy to have to be reversed.”
Straw told the BBC that cooperation with France was the only way of reducing the number of people making the risky journey across one of the world's busiest shipping lanes. The French and British immigration ministers are due to hold talks next week.
Roger Gough, head of the county council in Kent, where the majority of migrants arrive, said “historically the best experience we've seen of reducing the inflows is when there's been a successful agreement, level of shared interest, between the British and French authorities.” (AP)
(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)