Fly fake refugees back to Albania
IN THE mid-1990s, Albanian citizens began coming to the UK to claim asylum, posing as Kosovan Albanians. During the Balkan conflict, I was working as a Christian missionary in southern Albania and my group housed Kosovan refugees. When the Kosovo War ended in June 1999, the Kosovans rushed back to rebuild their homes, with a Nato peacekeeping force to protect them and organisations providing food aid. There wasn’t much work in Kosovo, though, and most of them soon became economic migrants. In the autumn of 1999, people in the town where I was working told us they had relatives claiming asylum in London as Kosovars.
Even Albanians who had lived for years in Greece headed to the UK on the same ruse. For reasons known only to UK Immigration, people were accepted for asylum claims as Kosovans until 2003, so thousands of ineligible Albanians obtained refugee status and eventually British citizenship. When the Kosovo ruse ran out, Albanian lads started to arrive here claiming their families were involved in blood feuds and they needed protection.
A few years ago, a Daily Mail journalist went to Krume in northern Albania to interview the deputy interior minister, who was frustrated that the Home
Office wasn’t sending boys back. I believe that to stop the problem of cross-Channel trafficking, we should join the Schengen Agreement. Brexiteers wouldn’t be happy about this, but by not being in it, we make the UK look as if the grass is greener here.
If we did join, our Border Force would need to do sweeps of the car washes and building companies in which many illegals are employed in Britain.
Finally, we should rule all Albanians ineligible for asylum, as there is no war or civil unrest in their country. Even Roma people are not tortured or imprisoned there, although they may be discriminated against. Then we could repatriate them quickly.
We could cheaply fund training in plumbing, mechanics and other trades for these young men in Albania, so it’s good news that the UK is investing there. Most of the lads want to do this sort of work and we would save the £600-£700 a month it costs us for foster carers for them, plus school expenses such as laptops and uniforms.
This year it was reported that Albania had the biggest increase in foreign tourists in Europe, so some could be trained in tourism and hotel work. We need to act swiftly and confidently to stop this human traffic.