More than 900 Channel migrants cross illegally to UK in less than a week with 359 arriving in one day
More than 900 Channel migrants have crossed illegally to the UK in less than a week, according to the latest Home Office statistics.
Official figures show 359 migrants crossed in eight small boats on Saturday.
Fifty-one of those had to be rescued after their small boat ran aground on a notorious sandbank off the Kent coast.
Several lifeboats and a Coastguard helicopter had to race against the turning tide to rescue the group from Goodwin Sands off Deal.
All 51 were taken to Dover harbour for medical checks, but no significant injuries were reported.
Yesterday’s arrivals follow 141 migrants who crossed the Channel in two boats on Friday.
The latest arrivals take the total to 902 in just five days, after 402 migrants were intercepted in seven small boats last Tuesday.
Fifty-eight of those who arrived on Tuesday were picked up from the boat at the centre of an earlier tragedy off the French coast, where five migrants on the vessel died.
The dangerously overcrowded boat, with 112 people on board, got into difficulties near the port city of Boulogne.
The boat had been stormed by a large group of African migrants as other migrants were launching the vessel on the beach at Wimereux.
Witnesses reported fighting amongst the migrants, some armed with sticks and other weapons, as the African migrants forced their way onto the boat.
Two males, one from Sudan and another from South Sudan, appeared in court in Folkestone on Friday, charged with immigration offences related to the deaths.
The pair had earlier been named and said to have been in their early 20s.
However, both have now been granted anonymity and their case is being heard in Folkestone Youth Court, after they claimed they were aged only 15 and 16.
District judge William Nelson said there was “real doubt” over the age of the defendants.
“In my judgment there is real doubt, the doubt is not fanciful,” the judge said.
Both defendants have been remanded into local authority care, and will appear in court again on Tuesday.
The arrivals over the past week have taken the total number of migrants who have made the illegal journey this year to 7,167.
That figure is well above the 5,745 who crossed from France in small boats at the same point last year.
A Home Office spokesperson said: “The unacceptable number of people who continue to cross the Channel demonstrates exactly why we must get flights to Rwanda off the ground as soon as possible.
“We continue to work closely with French police who are facing increasing violence and disruption on their beaches as they work tirelessly to prevent these dangerous, illegal and unnecessary journeys.”