By admin 
When you buy from our articles through links, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission.
Credit: Bernard Barron/AFP/Getty Images
Thousands of Vietnamese have entered Britain illegally, according to a people smuggler who said arranging such crossings from Vietnam is a “lucrative business”.
Speaking to one BBC According to a reporter, the people smuggler claimed there was “no human trafficking involved” and that the increasing number of people leaving Vietnam for Britain are doing so voluntarily. However, many of them travel under false promises of “reality and opportunity” for jobs in Britain and many end up being trafficked for work for gangs, the broadcaster said.
How many Vietnamese cross the Channel?
The number of Vietnamese people who earn illegal crossings to Britain has “expanded” this year, he said Infomigrants. In 2023, 1,306 Vietnamese arrived by sea, but 2,248 crossed the Channel in the first half of 2024 alone. Government data from May showed that immigrants from Vietnam have become the “largest group crossing the Channel illegally”. ITV Newsthe first time this has ever been the case.
Most of them are “particularly young, many only teenagers,” the spokesperson said The Guardian. But while the number of people crossing by boat has increased dramatically, the numbers arriving from Vietnam are not new. Instead, human smuggling gangs have switched to using ‘boats instead of the back of trucks‘ as a result of the stricter ‘surveillance and policing in ports’ that was introduced after Brexit.
“The so-called wave or change in patterns that we might be seeing now is not a result of changes that are happening now,” modern slavery expert Mimi Vu told the newspaper. “It could take months, even years, to get from Vietnam to Britain.”
Why are they leaving Vietnam?
For the most part to find better work. Many who travel west go “to seek a better life and send money back” to their families in Vietnam, finding the dangerous crossing worth the risk, according to The Guardian.
“Failing businesses and debt” were cited as push factors for many migrants, the BBC said. A migrant waiting near Dunkirk for passage to Britain said the broadcaster: “Life in Vietnam is difficult. I couldn’t find a good job. I tried to open a shop but failed. I couldn’t pay back the loan, so I have to find a way to make money.”
How do they get to Britain?
Smugglers take advantage of Vietnam’s “diplomatic ties between their country and former Soviet bloc countries” to get people to Europe, Infomigrants said.
With Russian visas becoming harder to obtain, many are now applying for legal work visas from Hungary (sometimes using forged documents), which are then used to travel across Europe to the French coast.
I’m talking to an undercover Sky News According to a reporter, another smuggler said that “no one would actually work” in the countries issuing the visas. “It’s just a ruse to get into Europe and ultimately Britain.” People smuggling gangs have exploited a variety of routes to bring migrants into the EU, including student visas for “study programs in Malta”.
Once migrants reach the French coast, the smugglers arrange a crossing, which is carried out by “one of the Kurdish gangs that control small boat crossings”, according to the BBC. This type of travel from Vietnam to mainland Europe and on to Britain can cost “between $15,000 (£11,570) and $20,000 (£15,470)”.
What happens to them when they arrive?
If they successfully cross the Channel, the migrants without family or friends already in Britain are often put to work by the smuggling gangs who encounter them on the other side, usually ‘in nail bars, or more rarely in cannabis farms’. , according to Infomigrants.
Many also “come to work in the sex industry,” he said The times. Women now make up more than three-quarters of arrivals, and many bring “a significant amount” of contraception.
The previous British government had confirmed it was in talks with Vietnamese authorities to try to reduce the number of people making the journey, and with Hungarian officials about issuing work visas allowing Vietnamese migrants to enter the Schengen zone.