Migrants in Calais: "There is a multiplication of attempts to pass through the English Channel," says Didier Leschi

While a migrant was found dead in Wissant (Pas-de-Calais) in a boat Thursday, November 4, "there is a multiplication of attempts to pass through the English Channel," said on Franceinfo Didier Leschi, Managing Director ofThe French Immigration and Integration Office (Offi).According to Didier Leschi, there are currently around 900 migrants in Calaisis where "the smugglers have managed to establish a sort of base camp".

Franceinfo: Do you confirm this influx of migrants today in Calais and around?

Didier Leschi: There is a multiplication of attempts to pass through the English Channel, in a situation where the number of people who are currently in Calaisis or in the north of France is much lower than the period when we had near10,000 people installed in the Lande de Calais, whom migrants called the "jungle".There are several categories of migrants, in particular people who have been dismissed from their asylum request in Germany or who have not been renewed their residence permit.We often confuse the number of people returned to Germany and the number of people who have effectively obtained a residence permit in Germany and it is not at all the same thing.They are also people who have just arrived in Europe, often from the horn of Africa.

How do you explain this influx in this period specifically?

The sea is rather favorable and unfortunately the smugglers have managed to establish a kind of base camp. This is the challenge of discussions and action of the police: to prevent these basic camps from allowing smugglers to set up this deadly traffic. This is why it is necessary to make regular evacuations, to limit the action of smugglers. There are constantly operations that are carried out, two orders: preventing people from going by boat and rescue operations. There are dramas, but they could be much more important if the action of the police did not aim to recover people in distress at sea. In all the debate that we have today with the collective Associations that support the two hunger strikers, we cannot allow these camps to multiply, who serve after the smugglers to pass people. There is a problem of image and dignity for everyone.

What happens once the camps are dismantled?

All that was proposed in the context of the mediation I have led is that people are systematically accommodated.The accommodation proposals are not in Calais itself, but outside, even if there can be a phase of a day or one night in Calais.It is the meaning of the opening of the SAS, which is disputed by the mayor of Calais but which is necessary.In the cold period that is coming, each person must have accommodation.The accommodation proposed by the State is not necessarily in Calais, because there is no reason, too, that the Calaisiens are the only ones to bear the charge of the reception.This can be a charge to see these influx of migrants.

Where is this SAS?

It is located in Calais and has a capacity of 300 people.Every morning, people are taken care of by buses to go to other perennial accommodation.People can access accommodation, regardless of whether or not they have applied for asylum.The action of the State in Calais is constant: it is more than a hundred associative jobs funded by the State, these are meals distributed in the morning, an access system for showers ...What the State does not wish is that there is, on the moor or elsewhere, of the informal housing close to the sea which allows the smugglers to set up this terrible mechanism which makes people candie at sea.

How to find the balance between elected officials who do not want a new "jungle" and associations that denounce the living conditions of migrants?

Some associations must understand that the accommodation proposal is best living conditions.The radicality which consists in saying that people have the right to park as they see it in Calais feeds a negative reaction of elected officials, who are afraid of the reconstruction of the moor, which can be understood.There is a kind of pincers that must be loosened, on one side saying that we offer accommodation, and on the other by saying that no, we will not let the Lande de Calais, whichwas unworthy for everyone.