Report from Andrew Harding Rensing Coast, south of Curry
Many French Gendermeuse saw boats on board but refused to intervene
As the weather on the channel clears, French police are struggling to stop a record-breaking surge in people reaching the UK with a small boat organized by a network of smuggling gangs. Downing Street said Tuesday that the situation is “deteriorating.”
French authorities claim they intercept over three-thirds of those boats before they reach the sea, but smugglers are now changing their tactics to launch so-called “taxi boats” from new sites at a new speed, in new ways.
Instead of inflating boats on the coastal dunes near police patrols, the gangs are launching them from hidden locations, dozens to dozens of kilometers from the main departure beach.
They then cruise along the coastline like taxis and buses, greeting paid customers waiting at sea, out of reach of the police.
Marianne Baisnée/BBC
French police say the boat is too vulnerable to stop at sea without risk of drowning
Just before sunrise last Friday, I met a group of 80 people who had gathered in the calm, deep-boobed waters, away from the beach near the village of Whisant, south of Curry. There were several women and children in groups in countries, including Eritrea and Afghanistan.
We counted the 18 French genderms viewed from the coast and refused to intervene.
The inflatable taxi boat run by a smuggling gang had just arrived at the sea and was now turning repeatedly. For perhaps ten minutes, one man sitting in front of the boat seemed to move people forward as he was on board in a relatively organized, even orderly group.
Some children sometimes cried on the shoulders of relatives.
“Yes, to England,” the Afghan man told me.
Taxi boat systems appear to have a little more control over what is often a chaotic and dangerous process to smugglers.
About a year ago, I saw the results on a nearby beach where around 100 immigrants were trying to pile up on the same boat. Five people, including a 7-year-old girl, were trampled and suffocated.
Lea guidedj/bbc
After launching from a hidden site, taxi boats will pick up customers cruising the French coastline
On Friday morning, Colonel Olivier Arary stood up and saw taxi boats piled up. He explained that the current operating rules for his unit are clear. If they are about to be drowned, they will intervene to save someone. If they are trapped in a sandbank, they may even try to stop the boat. But for all involved, it was simply too dangerous to try and reach the boat as police were floating.
“The police could do more…if the rules governing action at sea change,” Arary gives the police more room, mentioning the French government’s declared intention to amend these rules in a few weeks.
The BBC understands that French authorities will introduce new “marital doctrines” from the beginning of July.
“It’s essential that we create panic and not put these people at even greater risk. If the rules change to allow us to intervene in taxi boats as close as possible to these taxi boats, we will be more effective.”
Some officials say there is already a bit of a wiggle for the police in terms of strict interpretation of existing rules, but many fear they may face serious legal troubles.
“The average British watching this on TV might say, ‘Damn, those police don’t want to intervene.’ But it imagines boat panic.
“Without an order, it won’t move. Even if there’s a centimeter of water, it won’t intervene. That’s not frustrating,” said his union colleague, Mark Allegle.
As a result, the French forces, patrolling over 120 km (75 miles) of the coastline in northern France, focus all their attention on trying to intercept the smuggler’s boat before launching.
And while its interception rates are rising, smugglers are changing their tactics quickly.
Marianne Baisnée/BBC
Colonel Arary’s unit uses infrared drones to find and track immigrants gathering in groups along the coast
We first joined Colonel Arary and his men since midnight on Friday. This was the fourth night our team has spent on the beach in recent weeks.
Arary’s forces used infrared drones paid by the British government to find and track hundreds of migrants gathered in small groups along the coast, arriving by bus and foot on Thursday afternoon and evening.
On the monitor, we could clearly see one group gathered around a campfire between the forest near the beach.
“But that’s the smuggler we’re looking for. If we move towards immigrants now, they’ll just break up,” Arary said.
Then, around 5am, a report was raised that a taxi boat had been launched that climbed further up the coast, due to visible complaints from police.
“Let’s go,” Arary said.
A few minutes later we arrived at the iron beach next to the old fishing village of Ordresles, just south of Capgrisnez. The black Volvo V50 with the door open was stuck quickly to the axle in the pebble.
The car was clearly driving at high speed across the main road towards the sea.
Marianne Baisnée/BBC
Officers found abandoned black car on the beach
“Again they’re adapting,” Colonel Olivier Arary said. We looked into the black cords that smuggling gangs used to unstablely tie large inflatable boats to Volvo roofs.
The smugglers apparently inflated the boat in nearby sheds and farm buildings, drove it in a short distance to the beach, unraveling it, dragging it into the final few meters of water, safely on their way within seconds. Heading north, they gather passengers paying from other points along the coast, like buses and taxis. Therefore, it is the nickname for “taxi boat.”
“This is the third time that’s happened in this area,” he complained about the new new tactics used by smugglers.
Police are armed with night vision binoculars and drones, and are skilled the moment smugglers begin to inflate rubber boats. This is usually located next to coastal dunes and forests and rivers and canals. It is the greatest period of vulnerability for the gang and its clients.
With up to six electric pumps per boat, smugglers can often finish their work within 15 minutes. However, the inflated boat is large, difficult to use, and difficult to move by hand.
Police often have time to intercept the inflatable, usually by dozens or more people, before being dragged into the water. Officers occasionally use pepper spray and stun hand rena bullets to clear the roads and grind boats with knifes to prevent them from being used. The BBC sees footage of a police body cam and shows them throwing rocks at officers and trying to stop them by hugging the young child in front of the police.
According to French police, the gangs we understand are growing numbers in the Curry area as demand for crossings increases, but they secretly inflate boats and hide in buildings near the beach, as well as threatening local farmers who oppose their presence.
Some of these taxi boat launches are designed to make French police reluctant to intervene in the ocean, but they take place near major migrant departure areas around Curry and Boulogne, while some boats have departed all this time.
On Friday morning, Arary said the taxi boat launch had just been successful from Kayyu Sar Ma, a village about 100 km south of the Somme River. He was hoping it would arrive here around noon and try to pick up passengers near Boulogne.
One unintended consequence of smugglers’ reliance on taxi boat systems is that younger men have an advantage over women and children.
“I tried it [to cross] said Luna, a Somali woman from Mogadishu. She described incidents of police violence on the beach and the experiences left behind while the man appeared on the boat.
“Sometimes the police are very violent. I bumped into myself. They put tear gas on them – something in the air – you can’t breathe. Sometimes the boat is very far [out to sea]. That’s why women and children are left behind many times. It’s very dangerous and very dangerous. We can’t swim. Luna said as she was waiting for food at an informal immigration camp near Dunkirk.
She added that a month and a half after trying to complete her journey to the UK, she had no plans to quit.
Meanwhile, Colonel Arary was not ready to give up as he was unable to stop the launch of a taxi boat at the Single Beach in Ordresles.
“Let’s go. The boat is heading north towards Griz Nez’s cap. We’ll try to intercept them,” he said as his team rushed towards their car.
While we continued to the police we were able to see the boat on the left, a pale black stain of milky sea. But by the time we reached Wissant after 15 minutes it was already too late. The immigrants were underwater and the taxi boats were already half full.
Overall, it wasn’t a good night for the French police. Arary’s army claimed four successful intercepts on the land. However, along the entire coast, a total of 14 boats arrived at the sea, carrying 919 people to the UK.
Marianne Baisnée/BBC
The number of small boats across the channel is rising despite efforts to stop them
Later that morning, on a short trip to the sea on a police patrol boat, Colonel Arary reflected on his fight to stop the smugglers.
There have been so many challenges, from heavy equipment worn by police to those that have become dangerous to enter the water safely, to the inherent instability of boats that are prone to expanding.
But Arary said the UK itself holds the key to solving the crisis.
“It should be kept in mind that 30% of all migrants entering the European Union come here in the Curry region. They travel across Europe and come here because the UK is attracting them. The UK is attractive. The immigrants want to participate in it. [at home or in the EU]. ”
That belief – the British magnetic pull against immigration remains traditional wisdom among French officials and many of those who risk their lives to cross the channel.
Last week was a windy day, and on a beach next to an old bourbon-era fort in the village of Umbretuse, I met former fisherman Stephen Pinto.
“For immigrants, the UK is still considered an Eldorado. The British need to deal with this issue more forcefully,” he said. If they did not, Pinto warned of the growing violence between police and the local community, as well as the waves of migration from an increasingly troublesome world.
“This is no longer a problem related to dictatorship or war. It’s growing because of what’s happening around the world, climate change, the collapse of some countries’ economies, etc. I feel that the new waves today are growing.
