French PM to offer Boris Johnson EU migration deal after Channel deaths

Gerald Darmanin, Priti Patel’s counterpart, also says France is prepared to resume discussions on migrant crisis this week

Jean Castex will write to Prime Minister on Tuesday after verbal clashes between the UK and France
Jean Castex will write to Boris Johnson on Tuesday after verbal clashes between the UK and France Credit: John Thys/AFP via Getty Images

The French prime minister is preparing to offer Boris Johnson a post-Brexit deal with the EU on migration after the deaths of 27 migrants in the Channel last week.

Jean Castex will write to Mr Johnson on Tuesday after days of verbal clashes between the UK and France which saw Priti Patel, the Home Secretary, disinvited from a Calais summit of interior ministers to discuss the Channel migrant crisis.

Gerald Darmanin, Ms Patel's French counterpart, also said France was prepared to resume discussions this week but added that he would only do so once the "double talk" in London had stopped.

A UK government source said: "We are keen to work together and have conversations with them soon. This seems a positive step."

It is not clear what new measures France will put on the table, although it announced at the weekend that it was bolstering surveillance of northern French beaches with a plane from Frontex, the EU border agency.

Britain has proposed joint Anglo-French sea, air and land patrols to intercept migrants and return them to France. In his letter to Emmanuel Macron, the French president, Mr Johnson also urged a bilateral agreement for Channel migrants to be returned to "break the smugglers' business model".

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These options have been rebuffed by France, which has counter-proposed that Britain should allow asylum seekers' applications to be processed in France and accept those that are approved in order to neuter the incentive for people to cross the Channel in small boats. The suggestion has been rejected by the UK.

Instead, it appeared on Monday night that France is seeking an EU-wide agreement that could involve the return of Channel migrants to the continent.

Mr Darmanin called for a "balanced" accord that would offer "real solutions" for dealing with organised trafficking networks that are often spread across France, Belgium, Germany and other countries. He insisted it could not be with France alone, but with all of the EU.

"We do not want a unilateral agreement," he said after a meeting chaired by Mr Macron. "An agreement would set the framework for co-operation between Britain and bordering countries on immigration issues that were not negotiated at the time of Brexit."

The deal set to be proposed by France could include ways to ensure unaccompanied minors can safely reach Britain to rejoin their families instead of putting themselves at the mercy of traffickers, Mr Darmanin said. Britain has said the quid pro quo would be France taking back migrants.

Mr Darmanin rejected proposals that would see Britain unilaterally force migrant boats back to France, saying it was against international maritime law and would put people's lives in danger. "We cannot accept this practice," he said.

He also rebuffed calls for French police to intercept migrant boats already in the water, saying it was a dangerous method that migrants would resist, and reiterated encouragement for Britain to implement a legal route for migrants to seek asylum, claiming it would discourage people from trying to make Channel crossings.

On Monday night, the second survivor of the Channel disaster said he had to swim for 10 hours after the boat capsized and was partially paralysed as a result.

Mohammed Issa Omar, from Somalia, told the Kurdistani Rudaw station: "The incident took place three hours after we left [land at 10pm]. The boat began to capsize and water gradually entered. After half an hour, it broke and was filled with water. Everyone in it drowned."

Mr Omar reiterated a claim by the only other survivor of the tragedy that those on board the sinking boat had tried in vain to seek help from the British and French authorities, saying: "No one came. The boat was capsizing and people were dying. I swam for 10 hours in the sea."

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