French security forces arrested 38 migrants trying to cross the English Channel in a small boat to Britain after clashes with police, prosecutors said.
Three members of the gendarmerie were injured in an area near Calais on the northern coast of France, prosecutors in the town of Saint-Omer announced on Thursday. Migrants threw stones at officers patrolling the beach in SUVs on Thursday morning. A vehicle’s windscreen was shattered before it tipped over and fell into the soft sand, prosecutors told AFP news agency.
The migrants continued to attack the three gendarmes trapped in the car until their colleagues rushed to free them. All three suffered injuries, including to the head, but they did not need to be taken to hospital.
London has repeatedly accused Paris of not doing enough to stop migrants crossing the Channel in small boats. French officials say they are making efforts to stop them on the shore.
Britain’s Conservative government, led by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, has made stopping migrants attempting to cross the Channel a priority, but people continue to make the journey almost every day.
Source: The Delfi
