French navy enters UK waters ??

Reported today in the metro!l!
French navy boat caught escorting an illegal migrant boat INTO
UK waters and proceeded to usher the boat for about one hour
before turning and leaving them?
Apparently a British patrol boat soon showed up and took them in
tow for the rest of the way to Dover as they had run out of fuel ??
What's a navy vessel of a foreign power doing in our waters??
Are the French co-operating with us?
OR Collaborating with people smugglers?
So much for sovereignty and being in charge!!

Donkeyman! 👎👎👎

Re: French navy enters UK waters ??

After Britain made a deal with France and gave them money to stop this.

Re: French navy enters UK waters ??

I can't see that in the Metro (and I have looked), so a link to the story please?
Not doubting you but I can't see it, besides which nowadays any migrants rescued at sea by UK forces are immediately denied asylum so why you are getting so worked up I don't know - did you want the French to ram them or sink them?
If they aren't near the coast what would you expect them to do which is within the law?

I did read this in The Times today, showing the desperation of these migrants and with a few explanations too:

"Dozens of riot police arrived at dawn to clear migrants out of the disused warehouses by a railway line in Calais that have been their home for months.

Twenty were arrested and a further 126 bussed to shelters across the region in an operation designed to allow property developers to build 50 or so homes on the site.

Hours after their eviction under the gaze of local media, the migrants began returning to the silent and deserted 60,000 sq m of abandoned property."

"The French interior ministry office in the Calais area said that police and coastguards had intercepted 50 such boats this year and detected a further ten hidden along the shoreline by people-smuggling gangs. The office said that only 27 boats had reached British waters since January 1."

'... But after making 20 attempts and being caught at the border each time, he is ready to try on a boat again, he [Rachid, a 25-yo Afghan) said. “I have one brother in Birmingham and one in Glasgow. They came through Calais like me and went to Britain and they say it is a good place. They say the police are good, the people are good. It is not like France.” '

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/o...ants-rhw6gnpd7

I know it's The Times and that it is subscription only but if you don't want to take the free trial to read the full article the above gives you the idea.

Things have changed since the new year; new legislation has been introduced which prevents migrants from trying to claim asylum if they have been rescued by UK forces whilst at sea; asylum claims can be denied if the applicants have come from a safe country where they could have claimed asylum before reaching the UK; all details must be provided when making a claim for asylum so that new challenges to prevent deportation are not allowed; and more.

Plus the cooperation between France & the UK has ramped up, with us even supplying drones for example to aid early detection.
But there will always be a limit as to what can be done - for obvious reasons for example you cannot just shoot at & puncture a dinghy at sea and international laws restrict many options.
AFAIK more measures are planned, but as with so much these things take time.


It's not a thing unique to the UK/France either; Cueta (Spain's north African enclave) regularly sees many migrants at a time illegal gaining entry there and just this weekend Sky reports on 363 migrants rescued off the Libyan coast as the Med. continues to see lots of attempted crossings into Europe.

There is no easy answer, as an Italian MEP seems to recognize.
https://www.arabnews.com/node/1816291/world

Re: French navy enters UK waters ??

Google news migrants escorted across the channel into Britain by French navy

Re: French navy enters UK waters ??

This looks like the story.....

https://www.euroweeklynews.com/2021/...glish-channel/

Re: French navy enters UK waters ??

Thanks Mags, I found a report in The Sun eventually.
As I said though, what are the French supposed to do?
Sink them when they refuse to turn back?

Bear in mind that once rescued at sea by UK forces any UK claim for asylum is automatically denied.

"The French, however, have resisted on the basis that any attempt to board and turn back the boats is a potential breach of maritime law for putting the migrants’ lives at risk- a claim disputed by British lawyers."

The report states some of the changes and AIUI (as reported in various other sources) plans are due for release detailing further changes together with a new expected Sovereign Borders Bill.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/202...h-last-minute/



ETA:
Reading the report, the French navy escorted the migrant boat until a UK Border Force vessel was close enough to take over & rescue the migrants.

Re: French navy enters UK waters ??

The EC and especially the French are our enemy. Our government needs to take this on board. I believe that establishing a trade deal with the EC was a HUGE error, even if the EC had agreed with the terms which they still have not, the EC driven by France is continuing to call the tune. This surely must be ended and ideally with NO deals and a cold hard border and relationship. Let's build what is possible from that start.

Right now there are people both in the UK and the EU making a GREAT deal of money, mostly in the finance sector. Insurance is a real money spinner at present.

That's nothing to do with insurance as the man in the street knows it, it's to do with global payments across borders. This is where the sharks feed.

Re: French navy enters UK waters ??

Better News, in the DT, today:-

Channel migrants seeking asylum in the UK are smuggling themselves back to France because of Priti Patel’s crackdown, says a UK charity.

Care4Calais has revealed the case of an Iranian who came to Britain on a small boat but has since managed to return to Dunkirk after becoming disillusioned with his experience in the controversial Napier barracks used to house Channel migrants in Folkestone, Kent.

He told volunteers working for the charity that he had smuggled himself back to France on a lorry. “England does not have any law,” he told them.



“I don’t have a good memory of the place. It is broken from the inside.”

Napier barracks was at the centre of a near-riot when migrants being kept on the former military base after an outbreak of Covid-19 went on the rampage and set fire to buildings in protest at the Home Office’s refusal to move them to a hotel.

The Home Secretary has been under pressure to close down the barracks as an asylum centre, including from local Tories because of the conditions, location and spartan regime.

Care4Calais’s founder Clare Moseley also disclosed that two young men from El Salvador who had come to the UK to seek asylum had also applied to the Home Office to be repatriated, but had been told there was a waiting list before they could be returned home.

“Their father is in the military and the family was being pursued by terrorist and criminal groups so he sent them to England, but they are now stuck in Manchester. All they want to do is work and don’t like relying on the state,” said Ms Moseley.

She blamed the increasingly tough restrictions and hostility that the migrants faced for their decisions to seek to leave the UK.

The Government is seeking to deter illegal migrants from making the perilous journey across the Channel through increased patrols and surveillance on French beaches and a tougher approach to asylum.

A new law, introduced after Brexit, makes any migrant’s asylum claim inadmissible if they have been in a safe third country before their arrival in the UK. This weekend it emerged that Ms Patel is drawing up plans for smugglers to face life sentences, rather than the current maximum of 14 years.

A policy paper due this month is expected to tighten up what ministers claim is the “broken” asylum system by placing curbs on “litigious” human rights claimants who seek to delay their deportation and encourage judges to take a tougher stance against asylum seekers with criminal records"

.

Re: French navy enters UK waters ??

This comes as no surprise to me. As others have said, the Frogs are not our friends, despite our politicians continuing to insist that they are.

Out of all EU countries, France is the one which stands out as untrustworthy and behaving like an enemy to us.

I realise that many of our politicians (and no doubt civil servants) don't see them that way but I'm sure that they, too, are not our friends and have their own well being in mind rather than the country's.

The real problem is with these people. If the UK had a unified stance against foreign countries taking advantage of us, there would be no illegal immigrants here at all by now.

Of course, who is at the root problem for this? Us, for voting for them.

Re: French navy enters UK waters ??

What a turn up for the books Ted ??
Seems that Pritti is having an effect after all eh?
I wonder if the destitute m.igrants had to pay both ways or do they
get return tickets now ?

Donkeyman! 👍🤗👍