The Globe and Mail - 24.10.2019

A6 O THEGLOBEANDMAIL| THURSDAY,OCTOBER24,

Police in Britain are trying to iden-
tify the names and nationalities
of 39 bodies found packed into in
the back of a truck east of London
as concern grows that people
smugglers are exploiting weak se-
curity at ports in Britain and Belgi-
um.
Essex police said the truck was
found just before 2 a.m. on
Wednesday in an industrial park
in Grays, a town along the River
Thames. Of the 39 bodies, 38 were
adults and one was a teenager.
Police believe the trailer con-
taining the bodies was picked up
in the Purfleet container facility
near Grays at around 1 a.m. The
truck hauling the trailer had come
from Northern Ireland and a 25-
year man from Northern Ireland
has been arrested. Media outlets
have named him as Mo Robinson.
The trailer is believed to have
travelled on a ferry from the Bel-
gian port of Zeebrugge and it ar-
rived at Purfleet around 12:30 a.m.
It’s not clear how the trailer got to
Belgium or how far the people in-
side had travelled.
“This is a tragic incident where
a large number of people have lost
their lives. Our inquiries are ongo-
ing to establish what has hap-
pened,” Chief Superintendent
Andrew Mariner said. “We are in
the process of identifying the vic-
tims, however I anticipate that
this could be a lengthy process.”
Prime Minister Boris Johnson
called the tragedy “truly heart-

breaking.” In a statement the

House of Commons he added,

”All such traders in human beings

should be hunted down and

brought to justice.”

The case has raised new ques-

tions about security at ports and

what happens after Britain leaves

the European Union. There are

fears that a disorderly Brexit

could cause havoc at the border

and weaken security if there’s a

lack of co-operation or if officials

become overwhelmed with cus-

toms checks.

Most freight traffic enters Bri-

tain through the Port of Dover

from Calais, France, and security

has been increased by both coun-

tries to stop people smuggling. A

crackdown on migrant camps in

Calais has also led them to move

to Zeebrugge on the Belgian

coast, which has struggled to cope

with the influx.

Zeebrugge’s port is a major

shipping centre and around half

of its trade is with Britain. The

port handles 70 ship sailings a

week to Britain and it’s one of the

world’s largest transit points for

new vehicles. It also specializes in

shipping unaccompanied trailers,

where one driver drops off a trail-

er for shipping and another driver

picks it up on arrival. The trailers

are supposed to be sealed and

checked to ensure they have not

been opened or tampered with on

the way.

Zeebrugge has become a hot

spot for people smuggling, ac-

cording to Britain’s National

Crime Agency. “The majority of

clandestine attempts to enter the

U.K. involve concealments in

[heavy goods vehicles] and other

motor vehicles from Calais, Zee-

brugge or through the Eurotun-

nel,” the agency said in its 2019 an-

nual report. “Migrants put them-

selves in the hands of criminals,

who use different methods to

transport them, often in difficult

and dangerous conditions.”

Security has also come into

question at the Purfleet port,

which specializes in container

traffic and carries out limited in-

spections. The events in Essex

“puts into question on both sides

the robust nature of how trailers

are checked in and out,” said Ri-

chard Burnett, chief executive of

the Road Haulage Association,

which represents the British

freight industry.

Mr. Burnett said truckers are

under constant pressure from mi-

grants and people smugglers. The

smugglers often break into trail-

ers at night, load up migrants and

re-bolt the doors. Sometimes a

driver picking up a trailer might

not even know there were stow-

aways inside.

Mr. Burnett pointed out that

the trailer in Essex was a refriger-

ated unit, meaning the people in-

side would have faced horrible

conditions. “Even if it was chilled

to minus 5 [C] or if it was frozen at

minus 25, that’s horrendous con-

ditions,” he said. “The panic when

those people knew that they

couldn’t get out must have just

been unimaginable.”

It’s not clear where the occu-

pants came from, but Bulgarian

officials confirmed the truck was

registered in Bulgaria by a woman

from Ireland in 2017. However,

they said the truck left Bulgaria al-

most immediately after registra-

tion. Mr. Burnett said some un-

scrupulous British truck compa-

nies “flag out” their trucks by reg-

istering them in another country

as a way of avoiding tougher Brit-

ish regulations. The refrigerated

trailer is owned by an Irish com-

pany that rented it out for one

week on Oct. 15.

Britain has long been a target

for illegal immigration and peo-

ple smugglers and there have

been an increasing number of

deaths. The worst case came in

2000 when police found the bod-

ies of 58 migrants in a truck in

Dover. Around 1,300 people have

also crossed the English Channel

in small boats this year, roughly

twice the number in 2018, and at

least three are believed to have

died.

4½½policesee–toidentifyߤbodiesfoundintruc–

Gruesomediscovery

stokesconcernsabout

humantrafficking,

weaksecurityatports

PAULWALDIE
EUROPECORRESPONDENT
LONDON

Policeofficersmoveatruckthatcontained39deadbodiesinGrays,England,onWednesday.Therewere

adultsandoneteenageramongthedead.ThetruckhaulingthetrailercamefromNorthernIrelandanda

25-year-oldmanhasbeenarrested.BEN STANSALL/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

EU member states on Wednesday
delayed a decision on whether to
grant Britain a three-month Brex-
it extension, while Prime Minister
Boris Johnson said if the deadline
is deferred to the end of January,
he would call an election by
Christmas.
Britain appears closer than ev-
er to resolving its 3^1 ⁄ 2 -year Brexit
conundrum, after Mr. Johnson
clinched a deal with the European
Union on the terms of its exit last
week and secured an early signal
of support for it from Parliament.
But there are still hurdles to
clear, and Mr. Johnson’s ability to
deliver on a “do-or-die” pledge to
get Britain out of the EU by Oct. 31
is in doubt, after Parliament re-
jected a three-day timetable to en-
act his agreement on Tuesday.
European Council President

Donald Tusk said on Twitter he

was recommending that the lead-

ers of the EU’s 27 other member

states back a delay, which Mr.

Johnson says he does not want

but was forced by Parliament to

request.

Senior EU diplomats said the

most likely scenario was that the

bloc would grant a three-month

delay, with Britain permitted to

leave sooner if it could enact legis-

lation faster. There was also a

chance that some EU countries,

notably France, could demand a

shorter extension, possibly of just

days or weeks.

Mr. Johnson’s spokesman said

if the EU offers a delay until the

end of January there would need

to be an election in Britain, and

this could be held before Christ-

mas.

Mr. Johnson paused the bill

that would implement the agree-

ment he reached with the other

EU members, after votes on Tues-

day in which Parliament accepted

the deal in principle, but rejected

the three-day timetable to enact

it.

The government argued a tight

schedule was necessary to meet

next week’s deadline, but law-

makers said they needed more

time.

Ambassadors of the 27 made

no decision on an extension at a

meeting in Brussels on Wednes-

day, senior diplomats said. The

envoys will meet again on Friday

and hope to decide then, and

avoiding an emergency summit

of leaders on the issue.

The one big uncertainty is

whether France will agree. A

source at President Emmanuel

Macron’s office said on Tuesday

Paris was ready to grant an addi-

tional few days to facilitate the

British Parliament’s vote but op-

posed any extension beyond that.

“The additional delay will be a

few days, a few weeks maybe, but

not up to January as some people

are saying, that’s just not possi-

ble,” said Pieyre-Alexandre An-

glade, a member of the French

Parliament who handles Europe-

an affairs for Mr. Macron’s party.

An EU official said Paris needed

more time to decide its position

because Mr. Macron is visiting the

French island of Réunion in the

Indian Ocean.

Any extension must be agreed

unanimously among the EU 27.

They have agreed twice to post-

pone Brexit from the original

deadline of March 29 this year.

Both times, the French com-

plained but eventually relented.

Mr. Johnson confounded some

of his critics by emerging last

week with a deal with the EU,

which differs from an agreement

reached by his predecessor There-

sa May, mainly over how it han-

dles the land border of British-

ruled Northern Ireland.

Ms. May had agreed to apply

some EU rules across all of the

United Kingdom unless a new ar-

rangement could be found to

keep the Irish border open. Mr.

Johnson would effectively create

a new border in the Irish Sea, leav-

ing Northern Ireland to apply EU

rules while the rest of the United

Kingdom goes its own way.

That has cost him the support

of a Northern Irish party that had

propped up his minority govern-

ment, but could unlock the sup-

port of Parliament that eluded Ms.

May.

In the latest day of Brexit dra-

ma in Britain on Tuesday, law-

makers handed Mr. Johnson the

first major parliamentary victory

of his premiership by signalling

their support for his deal in an

early legislative hurdle.

But that was overshadowed

minutes later when lawmakers

defeated him on his timetable.

REUTERS

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JOHNCHALMERS
JANSTRUPCZEWSKIBRUSSELS

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