LONDON: A Sudanese man died on Wednesday as migrants desperate to enter Britain from France stormed the Channel Tunnel entran­ce, prompting governments in both countries to promise to beef up security there.

Freight and passenger traffic through the rail tunnel has been severely disrupted as migrants camped out in shanty towns in the Calais area have repeatedly tried to board trucks and trains travelling from France to Britain.

France said it was sending 120 more police officers to the site while Britain said it was pressing ahead with erecting a nine-foot fence to protect the terminal.

“One of the things we’re doing is pressing to ensure we can get the security fencing up as quickly as possible to reduce this problem,” British Home Secretary Theresa May said.

The situation has turned into a blame game with Eurotunnel asking French and British governments to reimburse it for the $11 million it has spent to increase security to cope with the latest migrant crisis at Calais.

The scale of the crisis has been highlighted by the sight of migrants lining roads and scrambling to jump into moving vehicles in recent weeks. Rocks have been thrown at trucks and migrants have in some cases clashed with drivers and police.

The man who died on Wednesday was probably hit by a truck leaving one of the shuttles that transport vehicles through the tunnel, French police said. French media said he was the ninth migrant to be killed in the crisis since early June.

There were about 1,500 attempts by migrants to enter the tunnel on Tuesday night, a Eurotunnel spokesman said, after 2,000 attempts the previous night.

Published in Dawn, July 30th, 2015

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