CALAIS, France, Sept 5 (Reuters) - Illegal migrants in the French port city
of Calais protested on Friday over what they said was police violence and
worsening humanitarian conditions, days after a group was foiled in a bid to
storm a ferry bound for Britain.
Calais has long been a magnet for illegal migrants trying to reach Britain.
But local authorities say their numbers have shot up by 50 percent in recent
months to around 1,300 as migrants flood into Europe fleeing humanitarian
crisis in the Middle East, northern and eastern Africa.
Some 200 migrants in central Calais chanted "No to police violence" and held
up signs reading, "Where are our human rights?"
"I've been here for only a few days but within these few days I have seen
some inhuman things, like people who were beaten by police and harassment,"
said a 30-year-old Eritrean migrant named John, who asked not to be
identified.
"Here, it's human chaos: no food at all, shortage of water, lack of
medication."
Local police said they were doing their best with limited resources.
"The fact is that police are also suffering violence, with one colleague
injured last Saturday," said Renaud Roussel, a member of the Alliance police
union in Calais. "There are more than a thousand of them, so the police are
under serious pressure right now to keep a lid on the situation."
Without formal accommodation, migrants living in makeshift camps dotted in
and around the city have grown more desperate in attempts to board trucks,
cars and boats to Britain, leading to increasingly violent clashes with
police trying to stop them.
The violence - including street fights between rival groups of migrants -
has led Calais' centre-right mayor Natasha Bouchart to call on Britain to
stump up millions of euros in funding for beefed up security in the port
area.
Migrants say they have little choice but to keep trying to reach Britain as
Calais police expel them from one makeshift camp from another and beat those
they catch on the run, while the city fails to provide for their basic
needs.
On Wednesday, more than a hundred migrants managed to climb over a fence in
the port area and tried to storm a ferry. They were only stopped from
boarding when the ship brought up its boarding ramp at the last minute and
crew used water cannon to turn the migrants away.
Earlier in the week, Eritrean and Sudanese migrants clashed in the streets
of Calais for several days in a row, injuring more than 50 - and one
critically - until a 'peace meeting' was held in a camp and the violence
ceased, migrants said.
"I have been here for 60 days, and I have tried to make the crossing on 40
days," said Adhanom Ghabrai, 28, an Eritrean migrant. "Every time I was
stopped by police.
A 16-year-old Eritrean girl named Rita showed Reuters a fist-sized bruise on
her upper arm where she said police had hit her with a baton, while others
reported having been beaten.
"Sometimes we have to drive some of them (migrants) to the hospital because
they have been beaten up by police," said Catherine Konforti, an aid worker
the with Auberge des Migrants group, which provides supplies to migrants in
makeshift camps. (Editing by Mark John)