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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
National
Diane Taylor

People smugglers are still profiting from small boats. Can the UK fix the crisis?

Migrants run across a beach near Calais as teargas smoke billows behind them
People run away from teargas fired by police as they try to cross the Channel from Petit-Fort-Philippe in Gravelines, near Calais. Photograph: Hannah McKay/Reuters

The smuggler works quickly. Using a small shovel, he digs up a dinghy buried in a sand dune on a beach not far from Boulogne-sur-Mer, assembles it and affixes a motor in record time.

“I never saw anyone work like this,” says Amad, from Iraq, one of a group of about 30 asylum seekers waiting to cross the Channel. “The UK government wants to stop the smugglers, but they are smart. They have plan A, plan B and plan C, so there is always a way for them to get people across this sea. For as long as asylum seekers will pay them, there is too much money involved for them to give up.”

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