Truckers block Calais to demand closure of migrant camp

Two convoys of trucks and tractors slowed traffic to a crawl on the motorway approach to France’s northern port of Calais on Monday, with protesters demanding the closure of a migrants camp they blame for mounting insecurity and an ailing local economy.

Spokesmen for the protestors say they will not cease until the French authorities give a definite date to permanently close the migrant camp known as the Jungle which now houses around 9,000 people all desperate to get to Britain.

More than 9,000 people live there in squalid conditions.

Thousands of people are blockading the Port of Calais, in a protest over a migrant camp home to 10,000 people.

Seven migrants have been killed on the road this year as they resort to increasingly desperate attempts to stow themselves away on trucks travelling to Britain.

The latest tactic has been to try and cause cars to crash thus stopping all traffic to allow the migrants a chance to climb aboard the trucks and stowaway.

In both French and British media, some drivers have reported individuals with knives and other weapons waiting by the sides of the roads, but aid organizations insist these are most often people smugglers, not migrants themselves.

“The main image of Calais today in the newspaper and on TV is very negative, all about the migrants and attacks on the motorway”, he said.

“As most foreigners come to Calais to try and reach Great Britain, I want our British friends to start dealing with requests for asylum in the United Kingdom in a closed centre on their own territory, and to take responsibility for returning those whose requests are rejected”, he told the regional newspaper on Monday (5 September). They say that the criteria now being applied are very narrow and are slowing down the process, making it virtually impossible to identify eligible children.

They carried a banner which said in French: “My port is attractive, my town is handsome”.

Calais Mayor Natacha Bouchart, holding an “I love Calais” T-shirt as she walked with merchants, criticised the Socialist government for failing to provide a global plan to end the crisis.

All in all, a whopping 10,000 migrants are smuggled into the United Kingdom yearly, according to French police and security sources cited by the Telegraph about a week ago.

Fears of growing numbers of migrants, partly fuelled by scenes from Calais, were seen as a key issue influencing the recent vote to quit the European Union.

Frederic Van Gansbeke, who represents businesses and shop owners in Calais and helped organise the protest, said: “We’ve had no answers, so we’re blocking things up”.

“We should not be misunderstood”.