French police expel migrants from Calais camps
AFP
May 28, 2014, 9:18 pm
Calais (France) (AFP) - French police early Wednesday began expelling around 650 migrants from camps in the northern port of Calais despite opposition from rights groups.
Several of the migrants left voluntarily when they saw the busloads of riot police arrive and ring their camps, from which they had hoped to cross to Britain.
Confusion was widespread, notably at one of the largest camps housing mainly Syrian and Afghan exiles, as the migrants have nowhere else to go.
"The people are on edge and are looking for the place where they will feel the safest," Cecile Bossy, from the France-based Doctors of the World NGO, told AFP at the scene.
The authorities say the expulsion is aimed at stopping an outbreak of scabies in the camps, where there is no running water or proper sanitation.
The people in the camps live in makeshift shelters and tents constructed essentially with bits of wood and plastic sheeting.
Rights activists said about 200 of the migrants sheltered overnight at a food distribution centre and police were Wednesday trying to evict them.
Some of the migrants put up improvised barricades with dumpsters.
"There will be no arrests except in the case of rebellion," the prefect, or the top administrator of the Pas-de-Calais region Denis Robin said.
- 'Messy evacuation' -
Bossy said the evacuation was being conducted in a manner that is "anything but professional."
The migrants are being asked to board buses and be driven to meet French immigration officials to examine their individual cases after having taken showers and undergone treatment for scabies, a contagious skin infection.
Illegal camps of migrants seeking to cross the Channel have sprung up in the Calais area since the French authorities closed down the infamous nearby Sangatte immigrant detention centre in 2002. Their numbers have nearly doubled in recent weeks.
Calais' deputy mayor Philippe Mignonet had recently said that between 40 and 50 people are caught each night while attempting to cross the Channel illegally.
France's Manuel Valls, who was recently appointed prime minister, took a tougher line on immigration than most of his Socialist party during his high-profile stint as interior minister.
Immigration and borders featured prominently in the campaign for last week's European Parliament elections, which saw far-right anti-immigration candidates score historic victories, including in France and Britain.
As the expulsion unfolded in Calais, about 400 migrants stormed across a towering, triple-layer border fence from Morocco into the tiny Spanish territory of Melilla, one of the biggest crossings in nearly a decade.
Many of the migrants living in Calais and trying to enter Britain illegally think they have a far better future there than in France.
Asif Hussainkhil, a 23-year-old Afghan who was rescued this month by the French coastguard while trying to cross the Channel on a raft fashioned with wooden planks and tarpaulin has said he will not stop in his attempts until he reaches Britain.
The young man who cannot swim said Britain was a "strong, powerful country" which had fascinated him since he was a child.
