UK's Starmer to double border security funding to curb Channel migrant crossings

Prime Minister Keir Starmer will announce plans on Monday to double UK border security funding and treat people-smuggling gangs as terror networks to curb Channel crossings. Addressing Interpol, he will call the gangs a “serious threat to global security,” urging global recognition of the issue's severity, according to his office.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer says he will double funding for Britain’s border security agency and treat people-smuggling gangs like terror networks in an attempt to stop migrants crossing the English Channel in small boats.

In a speech Monday to a meeting of the international police organisation Interpol, Starmer will say the gangs behind irregular migration are a serious threat to global security.

Arguing that “the world needs to wake up to the severity of this challenge,” Starmer will say that “we’re taking our approach to counterterrorism, which we know works, and applying it to the gangs,” according to extracts released by his office.

He’ll call for more cooperation between law-enforcement agencies, closer coordination with other countries and unspecified “enhanced” powers for law-enforcement.

Starmer plans to increase the UK Border Security Command’s two-year budget from 75 million pounds ($97 million) to 150 million pounds ($194 million). The money will be used to fund high-tech surveillance equipment and 100 specialist investigators.

(AP)

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