UK establishes new border command to counter illegal crossings

BIRMINGHAM, England

British Home Secretary Yvette Cooper told the House of Commons on Monday that the government is establishing a new border security command to curb arrival of migrant crossings into British waters from France.

Responding to a question by Lee Anderson, a lawmaker from the anti-immigrant party Reform UK, Cooper said the new command will have an additional cross-border police and new counter terror powers.

“Small boat crossings undermine our border security and put lives at risk and criminal gangs are profiting from this trade in human lives,” she told the parliament.

Anderson asked the home secretary whether if the government agrees with him that “it's time now to stop paying the French any more money or they stop being complicit in his evil trade.”

Yvette said the UK needs to new border command in place as the criminal gangs “have been getting away with it for far too long.”

“But it is also why we need to work not simply with the French police but also with police forces and organizations right across Europe and beyond in order to pursue the gangs and to prevent the boats reaching the French coast in the first place.”