Like many other professionals in the sector, this entrepreneur has witnessed “for several days” rising tensions between migrants and law enforcement. “And the worst part is that we know that it will start again.”
“Fuck the police, fuck the police,” shouted one of the migrants, who had climbed up an electric pylon. The object of his wrath: the will of the police to destroy a makeshift camp installed in the wood adjoining the Rue des Verrotières.
According to Korma Harar, an Ethiopian, “the police arrived and destroyed our shelters. We sleep here, outside, in the rain. They told us “get out of there,” and then several refugees said “where are we going?”
“It was already very tense when we arrived,” said a spokesperson of Médecins du Monde. “One of the migrants had been provocative, and the police closed ranks and moved forward.”
The migrants started throwing rocks at the police and they responded with launching teargas grenades. “It was war,” says the entrepreneur. Since Wednesday the distribution of meals by charities has been interrupted. “It has been tense for several weeks, we can not work in these conditions anymore …”
The CRS have deployed a large presence to disperse the 400 migrants, a figure announced by several witnesses, the nordlittoral.fr reported. “The CRS are no longer able to take charge. Apart from throwing teargas, they can not do anything. Migrants have even attacked my employees.”
Two police officers and five migrants were injured in the skirmishes and taken care of by the Calais Hospital Center. One of the wounded migrants is a minor who suffers an ophthalmological injury and could lose his eye. According to sources, the latter received a projectile in the eye.
An investigation was opened by the prosecution of Boulogne to determine the cause of the injury. “I will ask for an expert from the IML (Forensic Institute) of Lille, but we must wait until the migrant has been operated on,” said prosecutor Pascal Marconville. The investigation is currently entrusted to the police station of Calais.
“We have already sent letters to the mayor of Calais, the prefect, the sub-prefect but nothing moves,” says the entrepreneur. “One day, there will be a serious accident. We lose customers, my employees go off sick because they do not want to live this situation … It is happening every day from 8 am to 20 pm. What happened is very serious. Something must be done quickly.”
British volunteers are helping the migrants against the police as the numbers of Calais migrants swell to near-Jungle figures again.
After Theresa May promised to fast-track the asylum claims of people trying to reach Britain, migrants have flocked to Calais.
Charities said there had been hundreds of new arrivals since May announced the accelerated procedure after talks with French President Emmanuel Macron earlier this month.
They thought they would be put on to a bus and allowed to cross the Channel. Between 800 and 900 migrants from Eritrea, Ethiopia, Afghanistan and elsewhere have gathered in Calais.
Downing Street denied the Sandhurst Treaty, drawn up after intense lobbying by Macron for Britain to take more migrants, would encourage migrants to reach the UK. The French interior ministry however, confirmed that migrants were flooding into the town.
According to the treaty, adult asylum-seekers wanting to cross the Channel to join family in the UK will have their claims processed in a month, compared with up to six months at present. The period for children will be shorter.
A spokesman for the Pas-de-Calais prefecture said the migrants travel to Calais from other French cities.
Macron has accused “certain organisations” for spreading “lies” in order to encourage migrants to enter Britain illegally, and of fabricating claims of police brutality against them.
“People have false hope because of this misunderstanding,” Rowan Farrell, cofounder of the Refugee Info Bus based at the Calais warehouse, told Al Jazeera.
“There’s been no effort beforehand to explain to people what asylum entails in France, or what family reunification entails for people who are eligible for it in the UK.
“They think if they come to Calais they could be sent to the UK immediately. But we’re not really sure how that would work.”
While the French have demanded millions in funding to boost efforts to deal with migrants at Calais, the UK will get to “borrow the Bayeux Tapestry as a sweetener”.
The Sun blamed Prime Minister Theresa May for “caving in” to President Emmanuel Macron. According to the Daily Telegraph, Brexiteers on the Conservative backbenches described the added costs as “absurd”.
But the government insisted that the deal could save millions as it would bring down the the cost of processing illegal migrants and asylum seekers who reach Britain.