Fears Over Migrants Crossing Channel By Boat

There are growing fears that increasing numbers of migrants are travelling by small boats in an attempt to illegally reach the UK.

The French coastguard has told Sky News that tragedies like those seen in the Mediterranean could soon be seen in the Channel.

On Sunday, 18 Albanians and two Britons had to be rescued after getting into difficulties off the coast of Dymchurch, Kent.

Last month, the deputy director of border policing command for the National Crime Agency said gangs are being paid as much as £12,000 to smuggle people into the UK on inflatable boats.

Traffickers are thought to be turning to small boats because authorities are preventing migrants travelling on ferries in vehicles or through the Channel Tunnel.

In the latest incident, two boats suspected of being linked to people smuggling were found on Dymchurch beach.

People in the town say they are worried about security.

Sky's Lisa Holland, reporting from Dymchurch, said: "Locals have told me that a 20ft boat was abandoned on this same stretch of coastline two weeks ago and several vehicles of people were collected and driven away, they believe, by people smugglers."

The chairman of Dymchurch Parish Council, Roger Wilkins, told Sky News: "I'm very worried. This is the second time and they're coming into Dymchurch, or probably Hythe, or Livingstone, so we've all got to be very vigilant now.

"I've spoke to a few people this morning and they are just as worried as I am that how many more are going to try to come across the Channel."

President of the French coastguard, Bernard Barron, told Sky News the suspected smuggler craft found in Dymchurch was unsuitable for crossing the Channel.

He said: "It's starting to become a very similar situation to that seen in the Mediterranean and my biggest fear is that the same kind of tragedies we see in Greece or Italy will start to repeat in the Channel.

"They operate across the length of both the French and Belgian coastlines, between Ostend and into Normandy, finding new positions from where they can send their clients - the migrants - towards England.

"These smugglers - despite being given large sums of money - provide methods of transport for the migrants that are not suitable for crossing a sea like the English Channel.

"It's a sea filled with danger, with strong currents, storms and heavy traffic of larger vessels."

On Tuesday, another 17 suspected Albanian migrants, and a British man wanted on suspicion of murder, in Spain were detained after a catamaran arrived at Chichester Marina in West Sussex on Tuesday.

The 55-year-old Briton, who was the subject of a European Arrest Warrant, was also detained on suspicion of facilitating illegal immigration while the 17 Albanian men were held on suspicion of entering the UK illegally.

They have been detained while the Home Office considers their cases.

Two weeks ago, Yachting and Boat World reported that French police had arrested five people in the port of Saint-Quay-Portrieux, Brittany, after finding migrants stowed away on a yacht heading for the UK.

In February, four Iranians were rescued after leaving on an inflatable craft from Dunkirk.

And last month two Iranian men were found floating a mile from Dover in an ill-equipped dinghy in the English Channel.

Thousands of migrants have died trying to cross from north Africa to Europe and also from Turkey to Greece, with the UN saying that more than 700 may have drowned in just the last few days.