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The Documentary: The boat smugglers

The boat smugglers

15/03/2023 GMT

BBC World Service - The Documentary, The boat smugglers

How boats used in migrant Chanel crossings are sourced and the huge profits being made

How boats used in migrant Chanel crossings are sourced and the huge profits being made.

The recent rise in migrant boat crossings between France the UK is being fuelled, in part, by the more sophisticated methods gangs are using to source the boats

Last year, reporter Sue Mitchell and former British soldier and aid worker Rob Lawrie were alongside Border Force officials as they seized all manner of dinghies used in the crossings. Today that haul looks very different; the makeshift supply has been replaced by a sophisticated business which sees boats manufactured in Turkey and transported across Europe to the beaches of France.

This streamlined supply chain is big business and it has enabled the gangs to rapidly expand the trade; bigger boats made specifically for these crossings are mass manufactured in Turkey and shipped straight into the hands of smugglers. It is a complicated dodging of laws as they are transported across Europe, with authorities slow to react. And it promises to thwart whatever deals are secured between Britain and France to intercept the Chanel crossings themselves.

Presenter/producer: Sue Mitchell
Editor: Philip Sellars

(Photo: A group of more than 40 migrants run on the beach with an inflatable dinghy, as they leave France to cross the English Channel. Credit: Gonzalo Fuentes/Reuters)

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