The Hindu : U.N. offers to intervene in row over refugee camp

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Jul 07, 2002

International

International

U.N. offers to intervene in row over refugee camp

By Hasan Suroor

LONDON JULY 6. The United Nations has offered to intervene in the row between Britain and France over the Sangatte refugee camp located close to the French side of the Channel Tunnel and blamed by the British Government for an unending flow of illegal immigrants into U.K.

Almost every day desperate refugees from the Red Cross camp make perilous attempts to smuggle themselves into trains and lorries headed for Britain and while some succeed most are beaten back by the police — only to return the next day to try their luck again. Britain has been demanding that the camp should either be closed down or shifted farther away from the Tunnel but France says that the trouble lies with Britain's liberal asylum rules which make it the most favoured European destination for refugees.

The U.N. offer of intervention, made by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNCHR), Ruud Lubbers, here on Friday, comes ahead of a meeting between the British Home Secretary, David Blunkett, and his French counterpart, Nicolas Sarkozy, in Paris next week to ease tensions over the issue. Mr. Lubbers, who met Mr. Blunkett, said his organisation was willing to screen the 1,200 inmates of the camp to determine who were genuine refugees, and who were not. While those who qualified for asylum could be shared by Britain and France, others could be given financial assistance by U.N. to return home.

Most of the refugees at Sangatte are Afghans with a sprinkling of Kurds, Iranians and Turks. Mr. Lubbers said the UNCHR could discuss the return of Afghan refugees with the Afghanistan Government. Hundreds of Afghan refugees living in Britain could also be persuaded to return "voluntarily'', he later told The Guardian. On the Sangatte controversy he said: "This is a problem between France and U.K. Populations in both countries are becoming more and more critical of the Government that they cannot handle such a problem".

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