Reblogged from Alarm Phone.

Unanswered Questions

On the 14th of December, a boat broke apart in the middle of the Channel, leading to the deaths of at least four people. The total number of passengers on board has not been confirmed, nor how many people are missing from the group. Less than two weeks ago it was reported that Kent Police feared up to six people are still lost at sea. Despite the 30 days which have elapsed we still do not know anything about the four who lost their lives. What were their names? Where were they from? How old were they? Do their families know what happened?

The biggest remaining question is: how could their deaths have been prevented?

We wrote last month about our concerns regarding the lack of SAR assets present for these people during their journey. There is no confirmation that the French authorities were aware of the boat, nor that the British launched a rescue boat in anticipation of these people’s arrival into UK waters, as has been routine since the summer of 2022. Despite all the surveillance technology deployed in the Channel, and all the resources at the disposal of His Majesty’s Coastguard, Border Force and the Royal Navy, it appears that no one knew about this boat until the alarm was raised by Utopia 56 and Alarm Phone after receiving distress calls from those on board. Fortunately, a nearby fishing vessel was able to rescue most of the people who found themselves in the water after the floor of the dinghy gave way. The Dungeness volunteer lifeboat crew also made their best efforts to rescue people when they arrived on the scene. However, it remains unclear who had operational control of the search and rescue efforts. Why was this fishing boat the first vessel on the scene?

The Maritime Accident Investigations Branch has announced an investigation into exactly what happened on the 14th of December 2022. We are doubtful of how much hope we can place in this investigation, given their ongoing silence regarding the criminal negligence of both the French and British coastguards responsible for the loss of more than 30 lives over a year ago. Questions regarding who has an operational overview of such large scale missions are becoming more pressing with the anticipated withdrawal of the Royal Navy.

The Royal Navy, who militarised the response but simultaneously brought a lot of surveillance resources which made it easier for boats to be identified and rescued swiftly, is due to pull-out at the end of this month (31st January 2023). Border Force, who are not at all trained in search and rescue, will take back over the operational command of crossings but are also rumoured to want to end their involvement due to the reputational damage it seems to cause them operating a ‘migrant taxi service’. HMCG and volunteer lifeboat crews from the RNLI may then be left on their own with fewer resources and potentially more crossings in the next years.

So far in 2023, one boat of 44 people has successfully crossed to the UK. Rishi Sunak’s plan to ‘stop the boats‘ is unlikely to be effective in preventing more people from attempting these journeys. The government must announce how lives at sea will be preserved, rather than planning new legislation allowing for the detention and removal of people entering the UK through illegalised routes.

Misplaced Allegations

One decisive action from the authorities has been the arrest and charge of a 19-year-old accused of being at the helm of the boat on the 14th. Ibrahima Bah will appear in court tomorrow (Monday 16th January) and, if convicted, faces life in prison for ‘facilitating’ illegalised attempted arrival to the UK. During his first appearance in court, which was hampered by issues with the interpreter, he said he did not know what was going on or happening to him and that he didn’t even know what time it was. Under the changes to s.24 Immigration Act 1971 brought in by the Nationality and Borders Act 2022, all those in the boat on the 14th of December could be charged for attempting to arrive in the UK irregularly. If prosecuted and convicted they could face 4 years in prison after which they would be automatically referred for deportation as a ‘foreign national criminal’. The media attention around the criminalisation of Ibrahima fails to critically consider why he is being prosecuted when state authorities are responsible for the preventable deaths.

Some Answers

The reinforcement of security and control in the Channel is not the answer. Recent policy and legislation has turned the Channel into an immigration enforcement pen, where people are captured before being pushed into the UK’s dehumanising and defunct asylum system. Increasing safe and legal routes is not the solution to ending life-threatening crossings at sea either; those disqualified from accessing them would continue to find ways to make their journeys. To end the deaths in the Channel which are at risk of becoming commonplace, it is necessary to enable everyone to make the same safe journeys which those of us with papers are accustomed to – aboard ferries, on the Eurotunnel, and via plane.

Reblog de Alarm Phone.

Ce matin, nous avons appris que des personnes se sont noyées dans la Manche lorsqu’une embarcation avec environ 47 personnes à bord semble s’être désintégré en mer. Les circonstances exactes de cet événement restent floues, mais la zone dans laquelle s’est déroulée l’opération initiale de recherche et de sauvetage – sur la ligne de démarcation séparant les eaux territoriales britanniques et françaises – rappelle la situation qui a conduit à la mort de 32 personnes l’année dernière et soulève à nouveau des questions sur la coordination des garde-côtes français et anglais dans leur devoir de sauver des vies en mer.

Contrairement au 24 novembre 2021, il semble que la plupart des personnes à bord de l’embarcation aient survécu et pourront apporter leur témoignage sur ce qui s’est passé ce matin. Ce que nous savons actuellement en tant qu’Alarm Phone, c’est que notre association partenaire Utopia 56, qui travaille sur le littoral Nord, a reçu un message à 02:53 heure française (UTC+1) de la part d’un bateau en détresse. Les voyageurs ont transmis leur position GPS : 50° 59.294′ N, 1° 21.087′ E, à environ 15 miles nautiques au sud-est de la pointe de Dungeness.

Une minute plus tard, les voyageurs ont envoyé un message vocal en anglais que nous avons transcrit ci-dessous:

“Bonjour mon frère, nous sommes dans un bateau et nous avons un problème, s’il vous plaît aidez-nous. Euh, nous avons des enfants et la famille dans un bateau. Et un bateau, de l’eau qui arrive … nous n’avons rien pour le sauvetage pour … la sécurité. S’il vous plaît aidez-moi mon frère s’il vous plaît s’il vous plaît. Nous sommes dans l’eau, nous avons une famille.”

Le bruit d’un moteur hors-bord en train de tourner est également audible dans le message vocal.

Ni Utopia 56 ni Alarm Phone n’ont réussi à recontacter ces personnes pour mettre à jour leur localisation ni confirmer si elles avaient été secourues.

Utopia 56 a appelé les garde-côtes français au CROSS Gris-Nez à 02:57 heure française, et les a informés de la détresse de ces personnes, ainsi que de leur position GPS. Un e-mail de suivi a été envoyé aux garde-côtes français, à Alarm Phone et au MRCC de Douvres à 03:13, notifiant ainsi tous les acteurs concernés de la position de l’embarcation en détresse. Pour l’instant, nous ne savons pas si ni quand les voyageurs auraient passé leurs propres appels directement aux garde-côtes français et britanniques, ni ce qu’ils auraient pu communiquer aux garde-côtes.

La position GPS initiale envoyée par les voyageurs se trouvait dans les eaux françaises, bien qu’il soit probable que le bateau ait poursuivi son voyage en raison des bruits de moteur entendus dans le message vocal. Sur la base des données open source AIS et ADS-B disponibles sur VesselFinder et ADS-B Exchange, il ne semble pas qu’une opération de recherche et de sauvetage ait été lancée par les Français. Cependant, on ne peut le confirmer car il arrive que les bateaux militaires français opérant dans la Manche cessent de transmettre ou faussent leurs positions AIS, surtout lors de patrouilles. Notre suivi de l’activité de ces bateaux montre que lorsqu’ils sont engagés dans des opérations de recherche et de sauvetage ou qu’ils stationnent à côté de petites embarcations dans la Manche, ils transmettent systématiquement leur position par AIS pour s’assurer qu’ils sont visibles des autres navires.

La première preuve d’une opération de recherche et de sauvetage provient du côté britannique, environ une heure après l’alerte de détresse initiale. Nous ne savons pas quelles informations les garde-côtes ont pris en compte avant de lancer une opération de recherche et de sauvetage, mais à environ 03:40 UTC+1, le bateau de sauvetage 13-02 de RNLI Dungeness se met à l’eau et se dirige à toute vitesse vers une position située à 3,65 miles nautiques au nord-ouest de la position de détresse initiale envoyée à l’Utopia 56. Il y rencontre le navire de transport maritime Arcturus BA862 à envrion 04:20 sur la ligne de démarcation. À environ 4:20 UTC+1, l’hélicoptère des garde-côtes britanniques décolle de Lydd pour se joindre à l’opération de recherche et de sauvetage. Le navire de pêche Lass O Doume BM 181, le Dover RNLI Lifeboat 17-46 et le HMS Severn se rendent aussi tous sur les lieux.

Ce qui arrive ensuite en mer n’est pour l’instant pas clair. Le bateau avait-il chaviré ? Des personnes étaient-elles déjà dans l’eau, et si oui, depuis combien de temps ?

Le fait que l’opération de sauvetage initiale (ainsi que celles lancées plus tard dans la matinée, une fois que la situation soit clairement devenue critique) à eu lieu exactement sur la ligne de démarcation entre les eaux françaises et britanniques soulève des questions urgentes sur la coopération des garde-côtes pour s’assurer que ce bateau soit secouru.

Du fait d’avoir traité de nombreux cas avec nos partenaires en France, Alarm Phone sait que cette année, les bateaux pneumatiques ont été constamment, presque systématiquement ‘accompagnés’ jusqu’aux eaux anglaises par des navires français, afin de s’assurer qu’une opération de sauvetage puisse être mise en place rapidement en cas de détresse. Cependant, l’embarcation pour laquelle le Dungeness Lifeboat a été mis à l’eau ce matin ne semble avoir été ‘accompagnée’ par aucun navire français.

Nous avons également remarqué un changement de mode opératoire à la suite des décès de l’année dernière et des enquêtes actuelles auxquelles les garde-côtes sont actuellement confrontés : les garde-côtes britanniques mettent à l’eau les bateaux de sauvetage de la Border Force et de la RNLI plus tôt, en prévision de la traversée de personnes dans les eaux britanniques, plutôt que d’attendre que les bateaux pneumatiques se trouvent dans ces eaux avant de lancer une opération de recherche et de sauvetage.

Un bateau de pêche, l’Arcturus BA862, qui n’aurait pas été alerté d’un cas de détresse, a été le premier sur les lieux. Le Dungeness Lifeboat a été la premier navire de sauvetage a atteindre les personnes situées à la frontière maritime des compétence de sauvetage et recherche. Nous savons que le MRCC de Douvres a été alerté du cas de détresse à 03:13 UTC+1 par e-mail. Un porte-parole du gouvernement rapporte maintenant que les autorités britanniques n’ont été alertées qu’à 04:05 UTC+1. La question de cette divergence demeure. Si les autorités britanniques n’étaient au courant du cas qu’à partir de 04:05 UTC+1, sur la base de quelles informations le bateau de sauvetage Dungeness Lifeboat a-t-il été mis a été mis à l’eau à 03:40 UTC+1 ?

D’autres questions restent sans réponse. Les garde-côtes britanniques ou français ont-ils pris contact avec les personnes à bord du bateau après l’alerte de l’association Utopia 56 ? À quel moment la situation à bord s’est-elle détériorée ?

Les opérations de recherche et de sauvetage menées ce matin ont été importantes : tous les bateaux de sauvetage de la côte anglaise ont été mis à l’eau, de nombreux hélicoptères des garde-côtes français et anglais ainsi que des navires militaires ont également participé. Malgré toutes ces moyens, cela n’a pas suffi à sauver les 4 personnes dont la mort a été confirmée à l’heure actuelle. Bien que nous devons reconnaître les efforts de tous les acteurs participant à la recherche et au sauvetage dans ce cas de naufrage et au cours des derniers mois dans la Manche, la question finale demeure : pourquoi ces 43 personnes et des milliers d’autres ont-elles été contraintes d’effectuer un voyage aussi dangereux ? Des vies continueront d’être perdues si les États s’obstinent à renforcer les frontières militarisées au lieu de permettre à toutes et tous d’accéder aux voies existantes pour traverser la Manche en ferry et en train. L’annonce faite hier par le Premier ministre britannique confirme l’intention de son gouvernement de continuer d’entraver la circulation de certain.es. La liberté de circulation pour toutes et tous est le seul moyen d’éviter des pertes de vie comme celle d’aujourd’hui.

Repost from Alarm Phone.

This morning news again broke that people have drowned in the Channel after a rubber dinghy with approximately 47 people onboard appears to have broken apart at sea. Details of the event are still emerging, but the location of the initial search and rescue operation – on the border line separating British and French territorial waters – recalls the situation which led to the deaths of 32 people last year and again raises questions about the coordination of the French and English Coastguards in their duties to save lives at sea.

Unlike the 24th of November 2021, it seems most people on board the dinghy survived and will be able to provide testimonies about what exactly happened early this morning. What we currently know as Alarm Phone is that our partner association working in Northern France, Utopia 56, received a message at 02:53 French time (UTC+1) from a boat in distress. The travellers provided their location: 50° 59.294′ N, 1° 21.087′ E, approximately 15 nautical miles South East of Dungeness point.

A minute later Utopia 56 received a voice note in English which we have transcribed below:

“Hello brother we are in a boat and we have a problem please help. Uh, we have children and family in a boa. And a boat, water coming … we don’t have anything for rescue for … safety. Please help me bro please please. We are in the water we have a family.”

The sound of a running outboard engine can be heard in the background of the voicenote.

Neither Utopia 56 nor Alarm Phone was able to recontact these people to receive updated positions or confirm if they were rescued.

Utopia 56 called the French Coastguard at CROSS Gris-Nez at 02:57 French time and communicated the boat’s position, the phone number for the people, as well as the distress situation on board. A follow up email was sent to the French Coastguard, Alarm Phone, and the Operations Room at Dover MRCC at 03:13, thus notifying all relevant actors of the location of the boat in distress. For now we do not know if and when the travellers made their own calls directly to the French and British Coastguards, nor what they may have communicated to the Coastguards if they did.

This initial position which was shared was in French waters, although it is likely the boat was continuing its journey due to the engine sounds heard in the voice note. Based on opensource AIS and ADS-B data available through VesselFinder and ADS-B Exchange it does not appear that any search and rescue (SAR) operation was launched by the French. However, this cannot be confirmed as the French military boats operating in the Channel have been known to stop transmitting or spoof their AIS positions, mostly when they are patrolling. Our monitoring has shown that when engaged in SAR operations or standing by a small rubber boat in the Channel they will consistently transmit their positions over AIS to ensure they are visible to other ship traffic.

The first evidence of a SAR operation comes from the British side, around one hour after the initial distress alert. We do not know what information the Coastguards considered before launching a SAR operation, but at approximately 03:40 UTC+1, Dungeness RNLI Lifeboat 13-02 launches and proceeds at top speed to a position 3.65 nautical miles North West of the initial distress position sent to Utopia 56 and meets with the shipping vessel Arcturus BA862 at approximately 04:20 on the border line. At approximately 4:20 UTC+1 the Coastguard helicopter launches from Lydd to join the search and rescue operation and fishing vessel Lass O Doume BM 181, Dover RNLI Lifeboat 17-46, and HMS Severn all proceed to the scene.

What exactly transpired at sea is, for now, not known. Had the boat capsized? Were people already in the water, and if so for how long?

The fact that the position of the initial rescue operation (as well as those launched later in the morning, after the critical nature of the situation became clear) was on the border line between French and British waters raises urgent questions on the cooperation of the Coastguards to make sure this boat was rescued.

Through handling many cases together with our partners in France, Alarm Phone has been aware that this year small boats have been consistently, if not systematically, accompanied by French vessels in order to make sure they are in place to intervene swiftly should the boat become in distress. However, the boat which Dungeness Lifeboat was tasked to this morning appears to have been unaccompanied by any French vessel.

We have also noticed a change of operation following last year’s mass deaths, and the current investigations which the Coastguards are now facing: the UK Coastguard has been launching Border Force and RNLI rescue boats earlier, in anticipation of people crossing into British waters, rather than waiting for dinghys to already be in these waters before launching a SAR operation.

A fishing vessel, Arcturus BA862, who is reported to have not been alerted to any distress case, happened to be the first on scene. Dungeness Lifeboat was the first SAR asset, and reached the people on the border line. We know Dover MRCC was alerted of the distress case at 03:13 UTC+1 by e-mail. A government spokesman now reports that UK authorities were alerted only at 04:05 UTC+1. Why the discrepency? If the UK authorities were only aware of the case from 04:05 UTC+1 on what information was the Dungeness lifeboat launched at 03:40 UTC+1?

Other questions remain unanswered. Did either the UK or the French Coastguard make contact with the people in the boat after the alert from Utopia 56? At what point did the situation on board deteriorate?

The search and rescue response later this morning was massive: all Lifeboats along the English coast launched, with many French and English Coastguard helicopters as well as military vessels also participating. Despite all these resources it was not enough to save the 4 people confirmed dead. While we ought to recognise the efforts of all search and rescue actors in these case and over the past months in the Channel the final question remains: why were these 43 people and thousands of others forced to make such a dangerous journey? Lives will continue to be lost if states persist in reinforcing militarised borders rather than allowing all people to access existing routes to cross the Channel by ferry and train. Yesterday’s announcement from the British Prime Minister confirms the UK government’s intention to continue to illegalise the movement of some. Freedom of movement for all is the only way to prevent loss of life like today’s.

On the Franco-British border: Everyone’s at sea

The widely publicised shipwreck off the coast of Calais on 24 November, which left 27 dead, drew a few crocodile tears from the sharks that govern France and England. A show of hypocrisy that does not hide the truth: the deadly closure of the increasingly militarised maritime border of the Channel are the first responsible.

This is an English translation by activists from Watch the Channel of the article “Effets de manche” by Emilien Bernard published in CQFD n°204 (December 2021).

⁂

The French coast

From the beach of Sangatte, on a clear day, the white cliffs of Dover across the Channel are clearly visible. They shimmer about thirty miles away, no more, almost next door. A seductive mirage which no doubt explains why some people mount an attack on the Channel from this well guarded place. It rarely succeeds. “Not long ago, three Sudanese attempted to cross in a kayak in the early hours of the morning, but they were quickly intercepted by the coastguard,” explained Gabriella* of the Watch the Channel collective in early October.

Part of the European AlarmPhone network, which provides telephone assistance to people in distress at sea as they cross the Mediterranean¹, Watch the Channel was created in 2018 by French and British activists in response to the increase in attempted Channel crossings. The aim: to give the people concerned, and the associations that help them, as much information as possible to mitigate the risks. Among the instructions contained in the small flyer that the collective distributes to people on the move is this imperative: “Do not try without an engine”. Without an engine, there is a great risk of being carried away much further north by the currents. If drama was avoided for the trio in a kayak that Gabriella mentioned, this is not always the case. On Thursday 11 November, three people were reported missing after setting off in the same type of boat.

Similarly to crossings via ferry or the Eurotunnel, less and less popular because of the quasi-dystopian surveillance techniques that are now deployed to make it increasingly difficult, maritime attempts vary according to multiple factors. The weather, the logistics of the smuggling networks and word of mouth. Among these factors, the constant increase in police harassment in and around Calais is determinative. As a result, attempts are made from ever more remote areas spread along the 130-kilometre coastline facing England, from the Dunkirk area to the Bay of the Somme.

But even if there are numerous successful crossings (around 26,000 people between January and the end of November 2021), as well as rescues (8,200 on the French side for the same period, according to the Maritime Prefecture), the tragedies multiply as winter approaches. Officially three people died and four disappeared between January and mid-November – figures that are underestimated according to Watch the Channel. In addition, rescuers believe they are “on the verge of breaking point”.² And a chilling piece of news comes at the very moment of writing this article, Wednesday 24 November: twenty-seven more dead in a shipwreck off Calais. Twenty-seven.

The toll could be even higher. Because, unlike in the Mediterranean, here the official sea rescue services are currently carrying out essential work on both sides of the line separating French and English waters. Gabriella recalls the case of this small boat in difficulty on the French side, where two of the occupants were rescued while the others chose to continue, before being rescued later when the situation worsened. But Calais activists fear that the rescue situation will deteriorate. In mid-October, Gabriella warned: “We’re starting to get people saying, ‘We waited for hours to be rescued’. Or both sides passing each other the buck. And as winter approaches and hypothermia cases multiply, we fear even worse tragedies.” She adds: “The political climate in England is not exactly conducive to optimism.” To put it mildly.

The English coast

In the port of Dover, which is much less secure than Calais, there is a secluded area where people picked up by the Border Force are taken. Often disembarked in the early hours of the morning, they are regularly filmed by far-right activists, discloses Mark*, from Watch the Channel, showing me on his smartphone pictures of those in question who, according to another testimony³, regularly “intimidate and harass migrants”. “These people live-stream the arrivals saying that they are part of an invasion”, Mark explains. “Close to [the far-right group] English Defence League, they want to impose the narrative of the Great Replacement. And their narrative clearly has purchase with the government, which has an increasingly extremist posture.”

In October 2020, documents were leaked to the English press concerning discussions at the Home Office to curb sea crossings. Among the plans mentioned: the installation of a gigantic anti-small boat wave machine or the construction of a floating wall.⁴ These are unrealistic projects, no doubt, but they are moving forward along with other more concrete proposals. Like the possible construction of a detention centre for migrants on Ascension Island, a British overseas territory 4,000 kilometres to the south, in the middle of the Atlantic. The British are in fact coveting the situation at the Australian coastline, where the policy is to send people back to prison-camps outside its mainland. As for Home Secretary Priti Patel’s criminal proposal to push back boats to France, it is being seriously discussed by the British political class and has even led to exercises off Dover, with Border Force jet-skis practising intercepting boats. This is the hallmark of an out-of-control debate in which Patel feels she has grown ten-feet tall.

Home Secretary in the Johnson government since 2019 and muse of the right wing of the Conservative party, Priti Patel is a tough cookie. An admirer of Thatcher, a supporter of the death penalty and a fervent supporter of Brexit, she is the one who best embodies the extreme right-wing nature of the government. She is also responsible for the “Nationality and Borders Bill” currently being debated in Parliament which combines a tightening of the right to asylum with increased criminalisation of people arriving irregularly by boat. Even though the number of asylum seekers fell in 2020⁵ and the country takes in proportionally far fewer new arrivals than its European neighbours, the debate has become so toxic that the inflammatory Patel is accused within her own ranks of being too human rights conscious. A nationalist race to the bottom that is also, unsurprisingly, affecting the situation on the other side of the Channel.

Ping-Pong Politics

“Calais, tunnelling beneath humanity”. This was the title of the article published in the last issue of CQFD. A cold autopsy of the French state’s hunt for displaced people. Since our visit, it has continued in the midst of general indifference (see in this same issue, “Exiles in the mud and the cold: the state assumes no responsibility“), with the only response being an inflation of security in Calais and elsewhere. In addition to drones and police on horseback patrolling the shores, there is now a race for coastal video surveillance. This development has been documented by local newspapers, such as La Voix du Nord, which published an article on 22 October entitled “The elected representatives of Calais (almost) all in favour of anti-smuggler cameras“, mentioning the disappointment of the mayor of Marck-en-Calaisis: “The only downside is that the installation of four cameras has been proposed. This is insufficient for the politician.” The politician sets the tone: today as yesterday or tomorrow, it is insufficient, we need more and more cameras, razor wire, drones…

On Monday 22 November, Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin announced a plan to provide 11 million euros for equipment: quads, 4x4s and thermal imaging cameras. This is a small part of the 62.7 million Euro package promised in 2021 by the British to fight against illegal immigration. The objective: an ever more marked militarisation of the border, in line with European policies in this area.

Thus, month after month, the spectacle of an invasion staged as unmanageable and requiring an immediate martial response is perpetuated on both sides of the Channel, in a game of political ping-pong that relies on anxiety-provoking symbols and media coverage. “Calais is a highly strategic space in terms of communication, where new security policies are being tested on foreigners”, Juliette Delaplace of Secours Catholique reminded us in mid-October. Put another way by Corporate Watch activists:”[The city] is of fundamental importance as a symbol for anti-migrant propaganda – the perfect scare story that drives the border regime.”⁶

The umpteenth drama that has just unfolded off the coast of Calais, which for a while will have directed cameras and politicians to the scene, is already part of this security narrative, mixing denunciation of smugglers and calls for Frontex, the armed wing of European borders. One thing is certain: the blood in the Channel will not be washed away by those who shed it.

Émilien Bernard

Through the Looking Glass

The history of the reinforcement of the Franco-British border is made up of multiple milestones, from the Le Touquet agreement in 2003, dividing the roles between the two states (the British finance, the French control) to the Sandhurst agreement in 2018, extending it by tightening the security screws. On both sides of the Channel, the instrumentalisation of the migration topic has developed throughout this period, with obvious electoral aims. We are logically more familiar with the rough contours of this in France. But the English mirror of this growing state xenophobia is just as edifying. In a book entitled The UK Border Regime (2018), Corporate Watch activists detail the successive alliance of "Labour's war on asylum seekers" conducted following the election of Labour's Tony Blair in 1997, and then Theresa May's so-called "hostile environment" policy from 2012. A false construction of immigration as a problem to be solved urgently, carried out hand in hand with a reactionary media and a flourishing security industry, leading to what the collective refers to as a "dramatic escalation of the repression of migrants". The whole thing has since been completed by the triumph of Boris Johnson, the Brexit and the nationalist delusions made in Perfidious Albion. France-England: zero-zero.

Footnotes

1. See En mer Égée : “Le bateau a un trou mais les gardes-côtes ne nous aident pas”, CQFD n° 186 (April 2021).
2.  See Dans la Manche, les sauveteurs au secours des migrants craignent d’atteindre “le point de rupture”, Le Monde (18/11/2021).
3. See Channel Rescue, la patrouille citoyenne à l’affût des arrivées de migrants sur les côtes anglaises, InfoMigrants (26/03/2021).
4. See No 10 confirms UK offshore asylum plan under consideration, The Financial Times (30/09/Se
5. See, for example The Observer view on Priti Patel’s fake migrant crisis, The Guardian (21/11/2021). It states, “The number of people coming here to seek asylum fell by 4% last year and is at most half what it was in the early 2000s.”
6. In their book The UK Border Regime, 2018, freely available on the Web.

This is an English translation of the article “Effets de manche” by Emilien Bernard published in CQFD n°204 (December 2021).

Post written by Watch the Channel and Calais Migrant Solidarity

24/11

As news began circulating that a boat had sunk in the middle of the Channel and that 27 people, men, women and children, had lost their lives on Wednesday 24 November, both the British and French governments were quick to blame ‘people smugglers’ for the loss of life. The information that has emerged since shows that it was the decision on the part of authorities not to intervene, nor cooperate with one another, after being alerted to the boat in distress that lead directly to their deaths.

One of the two survivors, Mohammad Khaled, spoke with Kurdish news network Rudaw and explained his story. He says the travellers got onto the boat and entered the water close to Dunkirk at around 21:00 CET on Tuesday night. Three hours later they believed they had arrived at the dividing line between British and French waters.

Mohammad says that during their crossing the right sponson was losing air and waves were coming into the boat. People were bailing out the sea water and using a hand pump to reinflate the right sponson as best they could, but after the pump stopped working they called to the French coastguard for rescue. They shared their GPS position via a smartphone with the French authorities, to which the French responded that the boat was in British waters and that they had to call the British. The travellers then called the UK Coastguard who told them to call back to the French. According to his testimony “Two people were calling – one was calling France and the other was calling Britain”. Mohammad recounted that: “The British police didn’t help us and the French police said, “You’re in British waters, we can’t come.” Despite both HM Coastguard Dover and French Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre at Gris-Nez knowing the location and condition of the boat, neither launched a search and rescue operation.

A relative of one of the people on board, also interviewed by Rudaw, explains that the problems with the sponson began around 01:30 in the morning GMT. He was in contact with the people on board up until 02:40 GMT and was also monitoring the boat’s position, shared live on Facebook. He insists that at this time the boat was in British waters and that HM Coastguard was aware of the situation. He states: “I believe they were five kilometers inside British waters,” and when asked if the British were aware of the boat in distress he replied: “100 per cent, 100 percent and they [British police] even said they would come [to the rescue].”

The British denied that the boat was in their waters when asked by Rudaw. A statement from the Home Office reads: “Officials here confirmed last night that the incident happened well inside French Territorial Waters, so they led on the rescue effort, but [we] deployed a helicopter in support of the search and rescue mission as soon as we were alerted.” However, Rudaw (as of 29/11) still has not received a detailed response on whether or not HM Coastguard had received a distress call from the vessel during the night or early morning.

One question looming over the Home Office’s statement is what time-frame does it consider constitutes ‘the incident’? The statement mentions deploying a helicopter “as soon as we were alerted”. Flight tracking of HM Coastguard’s helicopter G-MCGU (named “Sar 111232535” on MarineTraffic) by Sergio Scandura shows that it did three flights over the area on 24 November:

The first time was between 03:46 and 06:26 GMT where it appears to fly an “expanding square” search pattern, and then circle some specific targets that it finds. If this is the launch “as soon as we were alerted” the Home Office refer to, did this helicopter spot Mohammad’s boat and were there other vessels launched to assist in the search and rescue mission?

The next time the helicopter was launched was in the afternoon, at 13:16 GMT. It appears to do “sector search” and again circle some specific locations. This is around the time that the French launched their search and rescue operation, and is more likely the launch and “incident” referred to in the Home Office’s statement. Only at 15:47 did the Préfecture maritime Manche et mer du Nord first Tweet that they were coordinating a search and rescue operation involving a shipwreck in the Channel. Data from MarineTraffic show that boats involved in the rescue, for example the Notre Dame Du Risban lifeboat of the SNSM only began to move towards that location around 14:00, around 12 hours after Mohammad and his relative state that they first spoke with the authorities. Most of the activity of the French vessels tasked with the rescue operation involved takes place around 51°12′ N, 1°12 E, a position only about 1 mile East of the line separating French from British waters.

This means that for around 12 hours, between approximately 02:30 and 14:00, more than thirty people were left adrift in a boat that was sinking and without an engine in one the busiest and most surveilled shipping lanes in the world. More information is still needed to definitely prove that Mohammad and the others in his boat were in British waters, for how long, and that their distress situation was known to HM Coastguard. However, given the testimony of Mohammad and the relatives of others in the boat, the first helicopter launch, and the amount of time which the boat was left to drift at sea, it is extremely likely that HM Coastguard was aware of the situation. But instead of intervening to save lives at sea, it appears they decided to play politics and hope that the travelers would drift back and drown in French waters.

Mohammad testified that even though water was entering the boat through the night and people were becoming submerged “Everyone could take it until sunrise, then when the light shone, no one could take it anymore and they gave up on life”. By the time the sun started to rise they had already lost hope of survival.

20/11

Mohammad Khaled’s account from the 24th is not the first of what appears to be deliberate non-assistance for migrant boats in distress in the Channel. Less that a week beforehand, on 20 November, we spoke with someone else whose calls for help in the Channel close to the border line seem to have been deliberately ignored by the British, and who provided the following account of his journey:

It was at 3am on Saturday 20 November when we put the boat in the sea. We are 23 in the boat.

After three hours, I think, we reached the British border then the fuel ran out, I think at 7 o’clock, and then we decided to call the 999 [the British emergency number]. Then we called and they told us you are in the French water without asking us for our location. They told us to call 196.

First of all we did not agree to call the French. We were trying to paddle but it was very difficult because of the waves. Then we decided to call the French. When we called they asked us to send our live location, then they told us ‘You are in UK waters’.

Then we called the British again many times but they kept repeating that we were in French waters and then they ended the call. The UK guys answered us in a very rude way and it seemed like he was laughing at us.

I told him two times that there were people dying in here but he really didn’t give a shit. We sent our live location a second time to the French coastguard. We also called them again, we were trying to reach them by two phones but they kept telling us we were in the UK waters.

So I decided around 9.30am to call Utopia. Then they helped us and they were forcing the French authorities to send the boat to save us around 10am or 10.30am. The reason why I’m sharing this thing because I don’t want it to happen again because it’s related to people’s lives.

Utopia 56, after being called by the people in distress, called to CROSS Gris-Nez, the French Maritimate Rescue Coordination Centre responsible for the Straits of Dover. Utopia 56 relayed the information they received and the position of the boat, and were then told by the CROSS that they were sure that the British had deliberately not intervened and let the people drift back to French waters.

Deathly consequences of a failure to cooperate

These two cases indicate that although Border Force has yet to implement forcible push-backs, turning around migrants boats’ with jet skis or dragging them back into French waters, push-backs are already occurring in the form of HM Coastguard deliberately refusing to come to the aid of migrants which it believes will drift back into French waters. This deliberate non-assistance is a deadly tactic that leaves people out at sea, in overcrowded and unseaworthy vessels, for many hours after they call for help, to traumatise the travellers and deter them from attempting to make further attempts at crossing to the UK by boat.

The French and British Coastguards “have a duty to cooperate together to prevent loss of life at sea and ensure completion of a search and rescue mission” under the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea and the Search and Rescue Convention. This includes a responsibility on both sides to contact one another as soon as information is received about people in danger and to cooperate on search and rescue operations for anyone in distress at sea.

However, it appears that the UK’s current anti-migrant policies mean that this cooperation in fact does not exist for migrants in distress in the Channel. Especially the UK government does not want to be seen to rescue boats immediately after they enter their waters. Furthermore, their criticism of the French for (in their eyes) not doing enough to intercept migrants’ boats at sea or prevent them from departing from the French coast, has seemed to poison diplomatic and operational relationships between the countries. For example, the Journal du Dimanche recently published that even in the investigations of smuggling networks there has been a breakdown in French and British cooperation.

Instead of cooperating to save lives at sea the Franco-British response has been to argue with one another, introduce more border policing measures (including aerial surveillance from Frontex), blame the victims and continue to scapegoate the smugglers. This has been useful to detract from their own failings over recent days, but will not improve the situation for the people who actually have to undertake such journeys. Further securitisation of the beaches and seas will only push people to try longer, more dangerous routes where there may not be good telephone network coverage. Small boats in distress will find themselves further from the large number of potential search and rescue assets located in the Straits of Dover.

Deaths of their friends and hours in distress adrift at sea without rescue will not dissuade people from trying to make the same journeys as they have no other options. Suggested solutions such as humanitarian visas will not provide everyone who needs it with a safe route to the UK. Others will continue embarking in small and unseaworthy vessels. Simultaneously, millions of people make this same journey each year aboard the ferries and trains that criss-cross the Channel several times a day without incident. Only by according the right to freedom of movement to all will we end the border apartheid and prevent further lives from being lost at sea.

Reblogged from Border Criminologies blog.

Guest post by Thom Tyerman, Travis Van Isacker, Philippa Metcalfe and Francesca Parkes. This post was written in conjunction with activist networks working against the UK border regime in Northwest France, including Watch the Channel and Calais Migrant Solidarity.

In March 2021, the UK Home Office published a white paper entitled The New Plan for Immigration (NPI) identifying asylum seeking as a primary source of ‘illegal immigration’. The NPI and the Nationality and Borders Bill it informs propose a dramatic overhaul of the asylum system, limiting full refugee status to those who are cherry-picked and brought to the UK via a restrictive ‘resettlement scheme’ while introducing a temporary status with less rights for people who apply for asylum after having travelled to the UK outside these routes.

At the same time, the UK will now render ‘inadmissible’, asylum claims made by someone who travelled through a ‘safe third country’ (European countries in particular) and seek to quickly deport them either to that ‘safe third country’, one they have a ‘connection’ to, or any other country that will accept them. However, at the time of writing, the government has still not been able to negotiate any returns agreements with other countries, meaning that, for the moment, ‘inadmissible asylum seekers’ are not facing deportation. Alongside this, the bill proposes to criminalise asylum seekers by introducing the new offence of simply ‘arriving’ in the UK without permission in addition to the existing offence of ‘entering’ without permission (i.e. circumventing immigration controls). The offence of ‘facilitation’ of arrival/entry is to be expanded to include people who do not act ‘for gain’ (i.e. who do not benefit materially or financially) and will carry a possible life sentence, although exemptions remain for organisations assisting asylum-seekers without charge.

The Nationality and Borders Bill is presented as paving the way for the UK authorities to enact push-backs in the Channel and detain people off-shore or overseas while their asylum claims are processed. The wide-ranging criminalisation proposed here seeks to supplement the hostile rhetoric and militarised security responses aimed at asylum seekers crossing the Channel in small boats which continue to dominate the media. Through this Bill, the British government hopes it can appear to fulfil its nationalist Brexit promise to ‘take back control’, even as it sells off rights, protections, and tax revenues in the pursuit of international corporate investment and new markets to form the basis of ‘global Britain’ (see for example, the Conservative Party’s plan to establish ‘freeports’ across the UK).

Without a hint of irony, the Home Office claims that its ‘New Plan’ champions the UK’s humanitarian commitment to refugees through expanding ‘legal routes’ for resettlement, dismantling exploitative smuggling networks, and discouraging dangerous ‘illegal’ crossings by blocking unauthorised arrivals from accessing refugee status and rights. However, these measures map directly onto the UK’s twin border security strategies of deterrence and externalisation. Humanitarianism and hostility go hand in hand in this ‘new system that is fair but firm’.

Civil society responses to the NPI – opposition or cooperation?

In the UK, civil society responses have widely decried the NPI as cruel, unworkable, and likely illegal under international law. Much of this opposition has coalesced around calls for the introduction of ‘safe and legal routes’ for asylum seekers: ‘pathways that enable people in need of international protection to travel to the UK in a safe and managed manner, normally through an application or approval process made overseas‘. Seen as necessary to minimise the risk of exploitation, injury and death refugees currently endure to reach the UK (and Europe more generally), civil society proposals include introducing ‘humanitarian visas’, schemes for relocating unaccompanied children, and expanding international refugee resettlement and family reunion mechanisms. See for example policy proposals by the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, Safe Passage, Migrant Offshore Aid Station, and Choose Love among others.

‘Safe and legal routes’ are presented as ‘an alternative…better, kinder and more human response’ to the ‘hostile legislation’ of the UK government. But the practical suggestions they entail look remarkably similar to those proposed by the Home Office, and do little to challenge the discriminatory power of the UK state. Visas have always been a tool for controlling and limiting free movement for some while maintaining or facilitating it for others. Indeed, it is because of the restrictive EU/UK visa system that people are forced to take irregular routes via dangerous means to reach Europe in the first place. It is not clear how ‘humanitarian’ visas would operate any differently or have different results to the current visa system. Similarly, it is not clear in what way the expanded resettlement schemes envisaged by humanitarian civil society would differ in practice from those proposed by the UK government. Both would still involve the pre-emptive rejection of vast numbers of people by representatives of the British state, or by those to whom they outsource, forcing people to take to the ‘illegal’ and ‘dangerous’ routes that resettlement or humanitarian visas were supposed to help them avoid; thus, rendering these routes doubly illegitimate.

It is also important to remember how inept and inaccessible existing resettlement schemes can be. In 2013, the UNHCR abandoned hundreds of recognised refugees in the Tunisian Choucha camp without resettlement or support, forcing them to take alternative criminalised routes to travel to safety. The UNHCR also produces training and materials for European state border officials, providing advice on profiling arrivals and expediting the removal of people who fail to meet their criteria of protection. As such, it directly participates in the criminalisation of people on the move, including those who have strong ‘humanitarian reasons’ for their movement. Far from a neutral humanitarian actor, the UNHCR is central to the global ‘policing of populations and borders’.

Furthermore, it is not clear how either NGO or government proposals would resolve the well-documented difficulties LGBTI+ people face trying to prove their eligibility for resettlement or humanitarian visas while still at risk from persecution. The idea that people displaced by the chaos of war can or should engage with externally imposed application processes is disingenuous and requires us to ignore everything we know about the challenges they face. And the UK government’s stated policy of refusing the arrival of refugees on its territory, while demanding other states to take them in on their behalf, saliently demonstrates continued British colonial statecraft and its sense of exceptionalism that has been pervasive throughout history.

In all these ways, the safe and legal routes argued for by the UK civil society fail to challenge the legitimacy of the British state’s criminalisation of asylum seekers which underpins its expansion of the hostile environment policies against them. Indeed, their proposals would result in reproducing the simplified categories and understandings of people’s movements as authorised/unauthorised, legal/illegal, on which criminalisation is based and legitimated. Some organisations do acknowledge this dilemma, and explicitly state the government should ‘respect and protect the rights of all women, men and children seeking asylum to do so (including in the UK and including by such other routes as they may need to take)’. However, others have fully embraced this new agenda, adopting the role of border police by pre-emptively criminalising asylum seekers and their supporters.

Choose Love: Humanitarian border police in Calais

In late May 2021, NGOs working with refugees in Northern France received an email from their British funders, Choose Love, instructing them to cease the distribution of ‘safety at sea’ leaflets. They also instructed Maison Sesame, which provides accommodation for refugees in Northern France, not to host people who were trying to go to the UK. According to Choose Love, their lawyers advised them that the safety at sea leaflets potentially violated UK immigration law concerning facilitation of illegal migration. They therefore amended their contracts to deny funding to any organisation continuing to distribute them. Despite widespread criticism from the NGOs, who insist the information provided is intended to save lives, is freely available, and does not constitute criminal activity, the decree from London has had a chilling effect as many organisations fear being unable to continue their work without British funding.

Given the hostile agenda at the heart of the Nationality and Borders Bill, caution around criminalisation is understandable. But rather than minimising this chance, the actions of Choose Love risk making it even more likely. Without prompting or legal precedent, they took it upon themselves to define certain forms of support as (potentially) criminal, signalling their own distance from, and disapproval of, this work. This pre-emptive move in effect enforces the border on the UK’s behalf, criminalising particular routes to the UK and anyone even seen to be supporting those travelling on them. Indeed, it is potentially more effective that the British state itself could be, since it does not need to prove any legal basis for its actions. And just as with the UK’s criminalisation and securitisation policies generally, it increases the risks and dangers refugees face by denying them access to potentially life-saving information and resources.

A long history of criminalising migrants and their supporters in Northern France already exists. This has taken the form of national legislation, such Article L622-1 of the Code de l’entrée et du séjour des étrangers et du droit d’asile (CESEDA), aka the ‘délit de solidarité’, under which people were charged with facilitating illegal migration for providing basic humanitarian aid such as food, clothes, or shelter. Meanwhile, the Calais Mairie and Prefecture have repeatedly banned food distribution to migrants in the city over the years. Criminalisation has also been pursued in less official ways through the everyday policing of migrants and solidarity activists, who are subjected to repeated harassment and cycles of eviction aimed at making their presence in the region untenable. Many of these acts of criminalisation have been challenged in practice, in the courts, and in public debate, revealing them to be politically motivated rather than legally set in stone. While at some points humanitarians are the target of criminalisation, at others they have acted in concert with state authorities to implement these policies – for example, to construct and then evict the New Jungle of 2015-2016. Whether motivated by fear of being found on the wrong side of the law or not, by pre-emptively criminalising the distribution of ‘safety at sea’ information, Choose Love continues this trend of humanitarians doing the state’s political dirty work for them. Embodying the epitome of neo-liberal bordering, and in the name of its humanitarian mission, Choose Love has volunteered itself to act as the UK’s border police.

Resisting borders

As the history of this border shows us, however, criminalisation is a political process that is contestable both in practice and in the courts. But this requires moving beyond making policy suggestions seen as palatable within our present hostile political environment. If we are to resist the authoritarianism displayed in the Nationality and Borders Bill, we must confront the tendency of humanitarianism to contribute to border policing, whether purposefully, as in the case of Choose Love, or incidentally as in the arguments for ‘safe and legal routes’. We need to reject the basic contours of the debate around borders and migration as already compromised, rather than something to work within. We need to refuse the flawed belief that we can distinguish clearly between people’s reasons for moving, identifying some as ‘legitimate’ and others as ‘illegitimate’, as well as those simplistic understandings of ‘chosen’ and ‘forced mobility’, ‘agency’ and ‘victimhood’, on which the criminalisation of migration rests. We need to challenge the assumptions that migration must be ‘managed’, that western states or humanitarian actors have the right to do so, and that it is done to protect the lives of those being managed. We must relinquish the seductive fantasy that ‘we’ can and ought to have ‘control’ over ‘others’.

Instead, we need to understand these arguments as alibis for maintaining global inequalities of wealth, power, and privilege built on histories of colonial exploitation and violence. We need to draw the links between economic and political structures that require people to cross borders internationally in search of a liveable life, and at the same time trap people in precarious employment and poverty domestically. We need to show how the same strategies of scapegoating and criminalisation are used against migrants and welfare recipients alike to cover up the hollowing out of society by successive governments in the name of global capital and their personal profit. We need to denounce the role of borders in upholding these global injustices, for both citizens and non-citizens, and acknowledge the unauthorised movement of people across borders as a political act of resistance in its own right. Ultimately, we need to be bolder in our arguments for solidarity with people on the move and highlight the importance of border abolition to our vision of a fairer and freer society for all.

Criminalisation et police humanitaire des frontières dans la Manche

Rebloggé de Border Criminologies blog.

Article invité par Thom Tyerman, Travis Van Isacker, Philippa Metcalfe et Francesca Parkes. Ce billet a été rédigé en collaboration avec les réseaux d’activistes qui travaillent contre le régime frontalier britannique dans le nord-ouest de la France, notamment Watch the Channel et Calais Migrant Solidarity.

En mars 2021, le ministère de l’Intérieur britannique a publié un livre blanc intitulé The New Plan for Immigration (NPI), qui identifie les demandeurs d’asile comme une source principale d'”immigration illégale”. Le NPI et le projet de loi sur la nationalité et les frontières dont il s’inspire proposent une refonte radicale du système d’asile, limitant le statut de réfugié à ceux qui sont sélectionnés et amenés au Royaume-Uni par le biais d’un “programme de réinstallation” restrictif, tout en introduisant un statut temporaire avec moins de droits pour les personnes qui demandent l’asile après avoir voyagé au Royaume-Uni en dehors de ces voies.

Dans le même temps, le Royaume-Uni rendra désormais “inadmissibles” les demandes d’asile présentées par des personnes ayant transité par un “pays tiers sûr” (les pays européens en particulier) et cherchera à les expulser rapidement soit vers ce “pays tiers sûr”, soit vers un pays avec lequel elles ont un “lien”, soit vers tout autre pays qui les acceptera. Toutefois, à l’heure où nous écrivons ces lignes, le gouvernement n’a toujours pas été en mesure de négocier d’accord de retour avec d’autres pays, ce qui signifie que, pour l’instant, les “demandeurs d’asile inadmissibles” ne risquent pas d’être expulsés. Parallèlement, le projet de loi propose de criminaliser les demandeurs d’asile en introduisant un nouveau délit, celui d'”arriver” au Royaume-Uni sans autorisation, en plus du délit existant d'”entrer” sans autorisation (c’est-à-dire en contournant les contrôles d’immigration). L’infraction de “facilitation” de l’arrivée ou de l’entrée sera étendue aux personnes qui n’agissent pas “dans un but lucratif” (c’est-à-dire qui n’en tirent pas un avantage matériel ou financier) et sera passible d’une peine de prison à vie, bien que des exemptions soient maintenues pour les organisations qui aident gratuitement les demandeurs d’asile.

Le projet de loi sur la nationalité et les frontières est présenté comme ouvrant la voie aux autorités britanniques pour promulguer des mesures de refoulement dans la Manche et détenir des personnes au large ou à l’étranger pendant que leurs demandes d’asile sont traitées. La criminalisation à grande échelle proposée ici cherche à compléter la rhétorique hostile et les réponses sécuritaires militarisées visant les demandeurs d’asile traversant la Manche dans de petites embarcations, qui continuent de dominer les médias. Par le biais de ce projet de loi, le gouvernement britannique espère pouvoir donner l’impression de tenir sa promesse nationaliste faite pendant le Brexit de “reprendre le contrôle“, tout en soldant au même moment des droits, des protections et des recettes fiscales pour tenter de séduire les investissements d’entreprises internationales et de nouveaux marchés pour former la base d’une “Grande-Bretagne globale” (voir par exemple le projet du Parti conservateur d’établir des “ports francs” à travers le Royaume-Uni).

Sans la moindre ironie, le ministère de l’Intérieur affirme que son “nouveau plan” défend l’engagement humanitaire du Royaume-Uni envers les réfugiés en développant les “voies légales” de réinstallation, en démantelant les réseaux de passeurs exploités et en décourageant les traversées “illégales” dangereuses en empêchant les arrivants non autorisés d’accéder au statut et aux droits des réfugiés. Toutefois, ces mesures s’inscrivent directement dans les stratégies jumelles de dissuasion et d’externalisation de la sécurité des frontières par le Royaume-Uni. L’humanitarisme et l’hostilité vont de pair dans ce “nouveau système qui est juste mais ferme”.

Les réponses de la société civile au NPI – opposition ou coopération ?

Au Royaume-Uni, les réponses de la société civile ont largement décrié le NPI comme étant cruel, inapplicable et probablement illégal au regard du droit international. Une grande partie de cette opposition s’est concentrée sur les appels à l’introduction de “voies sûres et légales” pour les demandeurs d’asile : “des voies qui permettent aux personnes ayant besoin d’une protection internationale de se rendre au Royaume-Uni de manière sûre et gérée, normalement par le biais d’une demande ou d’un processus d’approbation à l’étranger“. Considérées comme nécessaires pour minimiser le risque d’exploitation, de blessure et de mort que les réfugiés endurent actuellement pour atteindre le Royaume-Uni (et l’Europe plus généralement), les propositions de la société civile comprennent l’introduction de “visas humanitaires”, de programmes de relocalisation des enfants non accompagnés et l’extension des mécanismes internationaux de réinstallation des réfugiés et de regroupement familial. Voir par exemple les propositions politiques du Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, Safe Passage, Migrant Offshore Aid Station, et Choose Love, entre autres.

Les “voies sûres et légales” sont présentées comme “une alternative… meilleure, plus aimable et plus humaine” à la “législation hostile” du gouvernement britannique. Mais les suggestions pratiques qu’elles comportent ressemblent remarquablement à celles proposées par le ministère de l’Intérieur, et ne font pas grand-chose pour remettre en question le pouvoir discriminatoire de l’État britannique. Les visas ont toujours été un outil permettant de contrôler et de limiter la libre circulation pour certains, tout en la maintenant ou en la facilitant pour d’autres. En effet, c’est à cause du système restrictif de visas de l’UE et du Royaume-Uni que des personnes sont contraintes d’emprunter des itinéraires irréguliers et des moyens dangereux pour atteindre l’Europe. On ne voit pas comment les visas “humanitaires” fonctionneraient différemment ou auraient des résultats différents de ceux du système de visa actuel. De même, on ne voit pas en quoi les programmes de réinstallation élargis envisagés par la société civile humanitaire différeraient en pratique de ceux proposés par le gouvernement britannique. Les deux impliqueraient toujours le rejet préventif d’un grand nombre de personnes par les représentants de l’État britannique, ou par ceux à qui ils sous-traitent, ce qui obligerait les personnes à emprunter les voies “illégales” et “dangereuses” que les visas de réinstallation ou humanitaires étaient censés leur permettre d’éviter ; ce qui doublerait en fin de compte l'”illégitimité” de ces voies.

Il est également important de rappeler à quel point les programmes de réinstallation existants peuvent être ineptes et inaccessibles. En 2013, le HCR a abandonné des centaines de réfugiés reconnus dans le camp tunisien de Choucha, sans réinstallation ni soutien, les obligeant à emprunter d’autres itinéraires criminalisés pour se mettre en sécurité. Le HCR produit également des formations et du matériel pour les agents frontaliers des États européens, fournissant des conseils sur le profilage des arrivées et l’accélération du renvoi des personnes qui ne répondent pas à leurs critères de protection. En tant que tel, il participe directement à la criminalisation des personnes en déplacement, y compris celles qui ont de solides ” raisons humanitaires ” de se déplacer. Loin d’être un acteur humanitaire neutre, le HCR est au cœur de la “police des populations et des frontières” mondiale.

Choose Love : Police des frontières humanitaire à Calais

Fin mai 2021, des ONG travaillant avec des réfugiés dans le nord de la France ont reçu un courriel de leurs bailleurs de fonds britanniques, Choose Love, leur demandant de cesser la distribution de tracts sur la sécurité en mer. Ils ont également demandé à la Maison Sésame, qui fournit un hébergement aux réfugiés dans le nord de la France, de ne pas accueillir les personnes qui tentent de se rendre au Royaume-Uni. Selon Choose Love, leurs avocats les ont informés que les dépliants sur la sécurité en mer violaient potentiellement la loi britannique sur l’immigration concernant la facilitation de la migration illégale. Ils ont donc modifié leurs contrats pour refuser tout financement à toute organisation qui continuerait à les distribuer. Malgré les nombreuses critiques des ONG, qui insistent sur le fait que les informations fournies sont destinées à sauver des vies, qu’elles sont librement accessibles et qu’elles ne constituent pas une activité criminelle, le décret de Londres a eu un effet paralysant, car de nombreuses organisations craignent de ne pas pouvoir poursuivre leur travail sans financement britannique.

Compte tenu de l’agenda hostile au cœur du projet de Loi sur la nationalité et les frontières, la prudence concernant la criminalisation est compréhensible. Mais plutôt que de minimiser ce risque, les actions de Choose Love risquent de le rendre encore plus probable. Sans incitation ni précédent juridique, ils ont pris sur eux de définir certaines formes de soutien comme (potentiellement) criminelles, signalant leur propre distance et leur désapprobation de ce travail. Cette mesure préventive a pour effet de faire respecter la frontière au nom du Royaume-Uni, en criminalisant certains itinéraires vers le Royaume-Uni et toute personne considérée comme soutenant celles qui les empruntent. En effet, elle est potentiellement plus efficace que ne pourrait l’être l’État britannique lui-même, puisqu’il n’a plus besoin de prouver la base légale de ses actions. Et tout comme les politiques britanniques de criminalisation et de sécurisation en général, elle augmente les risques et les dangers auxquels les réfugiés sont confrontés en leur refusant l’accès à des informations et à des ressources qui pourraient leur sauver la vie.

Il existe déjà une longue histoire de criminalisation des migrants et de leurs partisans dans le nord de la France. Elle a pris la forme d’une législation nationale, comme l’article L622-1 du Code de l’entrée et du séjour des étrangers et du droit d’asile (CESEDA), alias le “délit de solidarité“, en vertu duquel des personnes ont été accusées de faciliter l’immigration illégale pour avoir fourni une aide humanitaire de base comme de la nourriture, des vêtements ou un abri. Parallèlement, la mairie et la préfecture de Calais ont interdit à plusieurs reprises la distribution de nourriture aux migrants dans la ville au fil des ans. La criminalisation a également été poursuivie de manière moins officielle par le maintien de l’ordre au quotidien des migrants et des militants de la solidarité, qui sont soumis à un harcèlement répété et à des cycles d’expulsion visant à rendre leur présence dans la région intenable. Nombre de ces actes de criminalisation ont été contestés dans la pratique, devant les tribunaux et dans le débat public, ce qui a révélé qu’ils étaient motivés par des considérations politiques plutôt que par la loi. Si, à certains moments, les humanitaires sont la cible de la criminalisation, à d’autres, ils ont agi de concert avec les autorités étatiques pour mettre en œuvre ces politiques – par exemple, pour construire puis expulser la New Jungle de 2015-2016. Que ce soit par peur d’être du mauvais côté de la loi ou non, en criminalisant de manière préventive la diffusion d’informations sur la “sécurité en mer”, Choose Love poursuit cette tendance des humanitaires à faire le sale boulot politique de l’État à leur place. Incarnant l’exemple même de la frontière néolibérale, et au nom de sa mission humanitaire, Choose Love s’est porté volontaire pour agir comme la police des frontières du Royaume-Uni.

Résister aux frontières

Comme l’histoire de cette frontière nous le montre, la criminalisation est un processus politique contestable, tant dans la pratique que devant les tribunaux. Mais cela exige d’aller au-delà des suggestions politiques considérées comme acceptables dans l’environnement politique hostile actuel. Si nous voulons résister à l’autoritarisme affiché dans le projet de Loi sur la nationalité et les frontières, nous devons nous opposer à la tendance de l’humanitarisme à contribuer à la surveillance des frontières, que ce soit délibérément, comme dans le cas de Choose Love, ou accidentellement, comme dans les arguments en faveur de “routes sûres et légales”. Nous devons rejeter les bases imposées du débat sur les frontières et la migration comme étant déjà mauvaises, plutôt que comme quelque chose à partir desquelles travailler. Nous devons refuser la croyance erronée selon laquelle nous pouvons faire une distinction claire entre les raisons pour lesquelles les gens se déplacent, en identifiant certaines comme ” légitimes ” et d’autres comme ” illégitimes “, ainsi que ces compréhensions simplistes de la ” mobilité choisie ” et de la ” mobilité forcée “, de l'” agentivité ” et de la ” victimisation “, sur lesquelles repose la criminalisation de la migration. Nous devons remettre en question les hypothèses selon lesquelles la migration doit être “gérée”, que les États occidentaux ou les acteurs humanitaires ont le droit de le faire, et que cela est fait pour protéger la vie de celles et ceux qui sont géré-es. Nous devons renoncer au fantasme séduisant selon lequel “nous” pouvons et devons avoir un “contrôle” sur “les autres”.

Au lieu de cela, nous devons comprendre ces arguments comme des alibis pour maintenir les inégalités mondiales de richesse, de pouvoir et de privilèges construits sur des histoires d’exploitation et de violence coloniales. Nous devons établir des liens entre les structures économiques et politiques qui obligent les gens à traverser les frontières internationales à la recherche d’une vie décente, tout en les enfermant dans la précarité et la pauvreté au niveau national. Nous devons montrer comment les mêmes stratégies de désignation de boucs émissaires et de criminalisation sont utilisées à l’encontre des migrant-es et des bénéficiaires de l’aide sociale pour dissimuler le siphonnage de la société par les gouvernements successifs au nom du capital mondial et de leur profit personnel. Nous devons dénoncer le rôle des frontières dans le maintien de ces injustices mondiales, tant pour les citoyens que pour les non-citoyens, et reconnaître le mouvement non autorisé des personnes à travers les frontières comme un acte politique de résistance à part entière. Enfin, nous devons être plus audacieux-es dans nos arguments en faveur de la solidarité avec les personnes en mouvement et souligner l’importance de l’abolition des frontières dans notre vision d’une société plus juste et plus libre pour tou-tes.