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Illegal Immigrants Caught Trying To Leave UK

Illegal Immigrants Caught Trying To Leave UK

A group of illegal immigrants have been caught trying to leave the UK and smuggle themselves into France by hiding in a lorry on a cross-channel ferry.

The Bangladeshi, Pakistani, Afghani and Sri Lankan nationals were caught by French border police when the P&O Spirit of France docked in Calais on Tuesday.

Two families - including two children - and another 22 men had stowed away in a Polish lorry.

All 28 immigrants were returned to Dover at 6.40pm that evening on P&O's Pride of Canterbury.

P&O spokesman Chris Laming told the Dover Express: "There have been occasions in the past when individual migrants have sought to go back to their homelands.

"But we have never seen anything on this scale before. It's very unusual.

"There is normally one way traffic from France to Britain in the tide of illegal immigrants.

"It is most unusual to see them going the other way."

A Home Office spokesman said: "Border Force officers in Dover are currently processing 28 people who were found by the Police Aux Frontieres in Calais concealed in a lorry which had crossed the Channel from Dover.

"Under an agreement between the UK and French governments the 28 were returned to Dover in the same way as clandestine migrants found at our controls in Calais are passed to the French authorities.

"If those questioned are found to have no right to remain in the UK we will take action to remove them."

Meanwhile, a suspected stowaway was killed in Norfolk when he emerged from underneath a coach where he had been hiding, only to be struck by the vehicle.

The man, thought to be in his 20s or 30s and of African or Arabic origin, is thought to have climbed beneath the coach as it left Calais in France.

He remained there, unknown to the driver, as the coach travelled almost 200 miles to Bexwell, near Downham Market.

The man was hit as the coach reversed into its home depot, and died at the scene from his injuries.