Join Us Demonstrate against the closure of Sangatte!!!, Don't make refugees shelterless and destitute !!! Fight for a Common European Policy that respects the Right of Asylum!!! Stop detentions!!, Stop deportation!! Defend the Rights of Refugees!!

We will be sending a delegation to France to oppose the closure of Sangatte, bring your passport if you are coming!!!

The now decided closure of Sangatte is a being hailed by David Blunkett as a victory against 'illegal immigration'. We believe it is a criminal act to take away what shelter refugees have. A recent report revealed the occupants of Sangatte are the victims of war and persecution in their own countries. Over 50% of them are Iraqi Kurds around thirty eight per cent Afghans, yet Blunkett likes to call them 'illegal immigrants'because he fails to realise in his efforts to appease racists he is now doing their bidding. The refugees of Sangatte are survivors of regimes like the Taliban or Saddam Hussein which our government is prepared to sacrifice the lives of our soldiers.

But when the victims escape it seems they matter not at all.
The only thing that is 'bogus' about the situation are the lies of right-wing politicians like Blunkett and Rooker and media who have sustained a lengthy hate campaign against people who have no voice or ability to tell their stories.

The sick fact is that what Blunkett is celebrating is the closure of a homeless shelter for refugees which offers them only the most basic of shelters against the elements and racist attacks. Refugees will not simply disappear when Sangatte closes they are real people and we are signed up to international agreements to protect them. More will come because they must and the more immigration controls mean more will risk and lose their lives. The present measures mean that only one refugee is getting through a day (crows Blunkett) so where will the rest go as the numbers build and the desperation increases? Once the winter sets in; back onto the cold, wet streets of Calais.

So why do they risk it?, anyone could presumably ask a
refugee this (but not David Blunkett) Refugees according to New Labour having "abandoned their families"(Rooker) who spend their life savings getting here and then they risk and sometimes lose their lives clinging to the underside of trains for £37.50 a week. How stupid do New Labour take people for?

It is clear that Sangatte is a symptom of both the British and French governments refusal to honour their commitments to the Geneva Convention. The Red Cross Humanitarian camp would not exist if governments heard refugees claims
properly. It is ridulous to call it a stopping off point to England, you might as well call the France, a stopping off point for England and try to shut that. Research has been done that shows refugees have not generally even heard of Sangatte before they get there.

Refugees come because they have family here already, or because they know that they have a better chance of a fair hearing in England. WE NEED POLITICIANS WHO WILL CAMPAIGN FOR A COMMON BUT DECENT EUROPEAN POLICY so that all refugees get a fair hearing throughout Europe, surely to allow refugees to seek asylum from perecution or War in another country is one of the standards by which we can call
ourselves civilised.

The closure of Sangatte may safeguard the profits of
Eurotunnel and the freight services but it puts their considerations before the established human rights that have been fought for and obtained at tremendous cost. They talk of honouring genuine refugees yet who are the people of
Sangatte if for example 4 in 5 Iraqis get asylum in England. So they cannot be "Bogus", "illegals" in France and yet genuine here. Asylum in any real sense is being ended by the actions of this government. The severity of border controls only plays into the hands of people smugglers that afford the only opportunity for refugees to reach Britain.

This government present track record on Asylum is a national and international disgrace, and refugees and asylum seekers, as well as minority groups are reaping the reward in racist attacks and murder. Now more will die on both sides of the channel as a result of the bigotry of a government pandering to racist sentiment and ignoring the fact that British society has been built on the work of migrant populations, even Oliver Letwin an unlikely friend of asylum seekers says that we need migration. We need mass migration from the extremely selfish point of view that with a shrinking birth rate and aging population we will be unable to meet our pensions obligations to the elderly unless we do, yet this fact is completly overlooked instead old people are being asked to work five to ten years longer.

So the determination to cling to racist ideology and
commentary with regard to refugees and asylum seekers will now cost refugees further misery and trauma,it is hard indeed to think that once polticians like Blair, Blunkett and Hain once went on anti-nazi marches.

Don't let them close Sangatte without any commitment to the right to asylum refugees !!!