Riot police destroy Calais migrant camps AGAIN as mayor slams Britain for being unable to control its borders
By Peter Allen
The Daily Mail (U.K.), September 29, 2009
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1216950/Riot-police-destroy-Calais-migrant-camps-AGAIN-mayor-slams-Britain-unable-control-borders.html
Hundreds of riot police were back destroying illegal migrant camps in Calais today just one week after the infamous 'Jungle' was torn down.
Armed officers carrying flame throwers, stun guns and tear gas grenades moved in on a stretch of wasteland close to the town hall where dozens of makeshift shelters have been built.
The onslaught came exactly a week after the migrant camp Jungle was torn down and 278 mainly Afghan young men were arrested.
Another raid began this morning – it is progressing well, said Pierre de Bousquet, Prefect of the Pas-de-Calais region, who said the main target was people smugglers who charge up to 1,000 for a passage to Britain.
Mr De Bousquet added: For months, weve been hitting the smuggling rings hard and were now organising at least one operation a week, without making a lot of fuss about it but with great efficiency.
But despite such confident words, almost all of the 'Jungle' detainees have now been released on human rights grounds, allowing them to resume their illegal attempts to get into Britain where they will claim asylum or disappear into the black economy.
Faced with such a grim development, Calais mayor Natacha Bouchard placed the blame directly on Britain being unable to control its own borders.
At least 20 new squats have appeared around Calais since the destruction of the 'Jungle', which at one staged housed as many as 800 migrants.
Mrs Bouchard said nothing would improve until Britain signed up to the Schengen Agreement, which allows anybody to travel between designated EU states without passports or visas.
Calais has become a no-go area, and thats because weve become hostages of the British government, said Mrs Bouchard, a member of President Nicolas Sarkozys ruling UMP Party.
Britain is unable to control its own borders, so were doing the job for them because theyre not part of Schengen.
There are still some twenty squatter camps in Calais alone, Mrs Bouchard added.
If Calais border controls were torn down, as Mrs Bouchard wants, then there would be no reason for migrants to set up the camps as they play a nightly game of cat-and-mouse with police as they try to illegally board lorries and trains to Dover.
As it is, Britain is continually imploring the French to improve security around the Calais area, where some 2,000 foreigners are still sleeping rough.
Great Britain has no right to put pressure on us, said a clearly angry Mrs Bouchard as she supervised the dismantling of the 'Jungle' at the end of last week.
Theyve imposed this situation on us. Every politician should keep repeating this on every single occasion.
'The more they say it, the more theyll be throwing light on the problem which has been imposed on it.
While police continually target new camps, keeping them closed is a never-ending battle.
