This is the moment a French escort vessel allegedly picked up a migrant dinghy just two miles from the country’s coast – before taking them across the Channel to British waters.
Footage emerged online of the French boat named Minck, searching for migrants on Tuesday evening.
It then appears to come across a dinghy off the coast of Boulogne-sur-Mer at around 12.40am on Wednesday.
However, instead of dropping the asylum seekers off to be processed in France, the vessel then allegedly travels towards British waters so that they can be dealt with in Dover, Kent, at 3.30am.
The user, who goes by The Little Veteran on X, captioned the post: ‘This video will open your eyes to everything that’s going on in the Channel.’
A mainly-male group of around 50 asylum seekers arrived at the Port of Dover on Wednesday, despite poor conditions including strong winds in the Dover Straits.
Footage emerged online of the French boat named Minck, searching the waters for migrants on Tuesday evening
A mainly-male group of around 50 asylum seekers arrived at the Port of Dover on Wednesday (pictured), despite poor conditions including strong winds in the Dover Straits
They were brought into the harbour in Dover by a Border Force catamaran around Midday
An image from the video on X, with the purple line representing British waters
They were brought into the harbour in Dover by a Border Force catamaran around Midday.
February 25 saw 290 migrants make the perilous journey in five vessels – an average of 58 people crammed into each inflatable dinghy.
This is the highest number of people making the crossing in a single day for more than a month, after 358 people were recorded on January 17.
Kevin Saunders, former chief immigration officer at UK Border Force discussed the footage on GB News and called it a ‘taxi service’.
He said: ‘From the French point of view, they don’t regard the law of the sea as the same way we do.
‘The French view is that they will only get involved and rescue these people if they ask for help. They say they are not allowed to go and get them, pick them up and taken them back to France.
‘We don’t necessarily agree with that, but that is the French interpretation. So they are basically shadowing the vessel to make sure it’s alright.’
A total of 2,006 asylum seekers have been recorded crossing the Channel in 43 boats to date in 2024, according to official government figures.
The figures came as the Prime Minister denied he is ignoring concerns being raised by locals about the use of RAF Scampton near Lincoln as accommodation for asylum seekers.
‘I’m not ignoring them,’ the Prime Minister told BBC Radio Lincolnshire as he was challenged repeatedly on Monday.
‘We do need to make sure that we house people in appropriate accommodation and the best way to resolve this issue long term is to stop people coming in the first place.
‘So anyone who cares about this should be backing us to get the Rwanda Bill through Parliament so we can get a deterrent up and running.
‘I’m confident that we really will be able to stop the boats and that will mean that we won’t have this pressure in all our local areas to find places to house illegal migrants.’
The Home Office has been contacted for comment.
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