English Channel Crisis: 9,000 Illegal Boat Migrants Land So Far This Year, More Than All of 2020

The Associated Press
The Associated Press
Kurt Zindulka

Showing no signs of subsiding, the migrant crisis in the English Channel has seen over 9,000 illegals reach Britain, as the government now downplays how effective the Rwanda removal scheme will be.

On Sunday, another 234 migrants crossed Channel in small rubber dinghies, adding to the 451 that landed throughout the week, Ministry of Defence figures showed. The people-smuggler coordinated boats continued crossing on Monday, with another 252 migrants being brought ashore after seven boats were intercepted in the waterway.

According to an analysis of government data from the PA News Agency, the latest crossings will have taken the total for the year to approximately 9,330, more than the entire year of 2020, which saw around 8,400 migrants reach British shores.

The latest crossings come as Deputy Prime Minister Dominic Raab has attempted to downplay how many illegals the government will be able to send to asylum-seeker processing centres in the East African nation of Rwanda, which the government has hailed as a potential deterrent solution to the growing crisis.

Despite Prime Minsiter Boris Johnson saying last month that the Rwanda relocation plan would see tens of thousands of people flown from Britain to Africa, Dominic Raab admitted this week that the number is “more likely to be in the hundreds”.

Raab said that he wanted to “manage expectations” about the scheme, in light of the looming legal challenges against the deportations, some of which have already been launched by left-wing activist groups and institutions, even before a single migrant has been removed from the country.

Figures such as Brexit leader Nigel Farage have warned that the government’s plan will be greatly hindered by the failure of Prime Minister Boris Johnson to remove the UK from the European Court on Human Rights, a non-EU body and therefore Britain’s membership in which was not impacted by Brexit.

Therefore, Mr Farage has warned, left-wing activists will be able to launch legal challenges to the Rwanda plan at the foreign court.

While the Rwanda plan has apparently failed to act as a deterrent as of yet, some illegal migrants already in Britain have reportedly asked the government to send them back to their homelands rather than being sent to the East African nation, The Mail on Sunday reported.

Commenting on the reports of some illegals forfeiting their asylum claims, Migration Watch UK chairman Alp Mehmet said: “If the scheme is having an effect then I welcome that.

“Rwanda is not the whole solution but I think it is a necessary part of what ultimately discourages people from jumping into dinghies, risking their lives and paying traffickers to do it.”

Meanwhile, the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) once again condemned the government’s plan to send illegal migrants offshore, saying they are “strongly opposed” to the scheme.

“Financial support abroad for certain refugee crises cannot replace the responsibility of States and the obligation to receive asylum seekers and protect refugees on their own territory – irrespective of race, nationality and mode of arrival,” the globalist body wrote.

Follow Kurt Zindulka on Twitter here @KurtZindulka

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