A man has been killed as at least
1,500 migrants tried to enter the Channel Tunnel in Calais on Tuesday
night, French police have said.
It came as David Cameron pledged that the UK government would do everything it could to combat the crisis.
Speaking
as the UK confirmed an extra £7m funding for new fencing at the
terminal, the prime minister said the situation was "very concerning".
More than 2,000 people tried to get into the terminal on Monday night.
'Every sympathy'
The man who died on Tuesday night was Sudanese, aged between 25 and 30, according to the France Info website.
He is reported to have been hit by a lorry.
Media captionA night-vision camera shows migrants scaling a huge fence at Calais
Speaking
in Singapore, the prime minister said Home Secretary Theresa May would
chair a meeting of the government's emergency committee, Cobra, about
the crisis later.
"I have every sympathy with holidaymakers who
are finding access to Calais difficult because of the disturbances there
and we will do everything we can to work with the French to bring these
things to a conclusion," Mr Cameron said.
"There's no point
trying to point fingers of blame, it's about working with the French,
putting in place these additional security measures, adding in the
investment where that's needed - Britain will always come forward with
that."
A Home Office spokesman said an additional £7m funding - outlined by the Home Secretary earlier this month - will pay for 1.2 miles of new fencing at the Eurotunnel site at Coquelles.
Work to put up fencing began earlier this month and was due to be completed this week, the Home Office added.
Media captionDavid Cameron: ''We're doing everything we can''
The
incursions have caused serious delays to Eurotunnel train services -
with passengers held up for about an hour on the British side and 30
minutes on the French side on Tuesday, French news agency AFP reported.
Kent Police reintroduced Operation Stack following the incident, leading to long delays for lorries on sections of the M20 near the Channel Tunnel.
A
spokesman for Eurotunnel - which manages and operate Channel Tunnel
services - said migrant incursions were now "an almost nightly
occurrence". It is an issue for the government to "sort out", the
spokesman said.
"We need them to stop the migrant flow from Calais but it appears to be too much for them to handle," he added.
'The way forward'
However,
UKIP leader Nigel Farage said the Army should be drafted in to help
search vehicles coming into Britain for illegal immigrants.
Don
Armour, head of international affairs at the Freight Transport
Association, backed his calls, saying: "They're trained and they would
know what to do.
"It may not be the way forward that would be
approved. But perhaps it could be one of a number of solutions that the
government might like to consider because we could be talking about
people's lives," he told BBC Radio 4's The World Tonight programme.
The
latest death takes the number of migrants who have died this summer
trying to reach Britain through the Channel Tunnel to nine. The
home secretary held talks on the migrant issue with French Interior
Minister Bernard Cazeneuve on Tuesday, saying the two governments were
working "in close collaboration and co-operation on this issue".
"We
are both clear that we need to ensure we are dealing with the terrible
criminal gangs, the people smugglers, who are making a profit out of the
human misery of many people," Mrs May added.
'We work together'
Asked
why British taxpayers should be paying for a problem taking place on
French soil, she said French authorities have also committed extra
resources to security at Calais.
"We have juxtaposed controls at the border. We work together on dealing with this particular problem," she added.
Earlier
this month, Mrs May announced that a new secure zone would be created
at Calais for UK-bound lorries in response to an unprecedented surge in
migrants attempting to cross the Channel.
AFP says an official
count at the beginning of July found that about 3,000 migrants - mainly
from Ethiopia, Eritrea, Sudan and Afghanistan - were camping in Calais
and trying to get across the Channel.
Have
you been affected by the issues in this story? Are you travelling by
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