Using the term Guantanamo brings to mind torture and Al Qaeda. The article below is about a detention center for asylum seekers and undocumented immigrants, not terrorists. Perhaps what is similar is the proposed location - a sort of no-man's land location - an "ambiguous" UK control zone that will make it easier to transport prisoners across international boundaries.
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The Calais ‘Guantanamo’
French and British ministers in talks to open dockside holding centre for illegal immigrants and asylum-seekers
By John Lichfield in Paris and Ben Russell
Saturday, 21 March 2009
The British and French governments are discussing the creation of a new immigrant holding centre within the Calais docks which would be "inside Britain" under immigration law and allow cross-Channel asylum-seekers to be shipped back to their home countries easily.
Although no details have yet been agreed, the idea is to exploit the ambiguous legal status of a British "control zone" of the Calais port, created in 2003, to cut through the mesh of legal difficulties which prevent asylum-seekers from being expelled to their countries of origin.
The idea – discussed by the British and French immigration ministers last month – seeks to turn the tables on the asylum-seekers and the gangs who smuggle them into northern France. At present, the immigrants gathered in Calais, mostly from Afghanistan, Kurdistan and the Horn of Africa, can exploit contradictions and grey areas in European and international law on immigration and asylum to evade expulsion from France. They can be arrested repeatedly only to be freed to try to enter Britain illegally again.
The holding centre would potentially allow London and Paris to use the ambiguous status of the British "control zone" at Calais to send the migrants home. If agreed, the centre is likely to attract the scrutiny of civil liberties and human rights groups.
The creation of an "offshore, on-shore" holding centre, which helps London and Paris cut through the thickets of asylum law, may invite parallels with Guantanamo Bay. Although the idea would be to hold the asylum-seekers for only a short time in humane conditions, the immigrants would have fallen into a legal limbo of their own making.
Hints of the Franco-British discussions were dropped this week by the British Immigration minister, Phil Woolas. He said Britain and France were discussing a new "detention centre" in Calais where illegal immigrants would be held "after passing through British immigration controls" within the Calais docks. They would be sent back to their home countries on charter flights.
Mr Woolas said that London and Paris wanted to "send a message" to immigrants and their smugglers. "We want to increase the profile of the deportations because we have to get the message back to Afghanistan and Iraq that Britain is not the Promised Land," he said.
The minister's remarks were widely mocked in the British press after they were – allegedly – dismissed the same night by the French Immigration Minister, Eric Besson. In fact, M. Besson did not repudiate Mr Woolas. He said France had no intention of building a new Sangatte refugee camp – a different animal entirely. The French government was embarrassed, and angered, by the British minister's remarks, because the words "detention centre" have a sinister, historical ring to the French. Paris prefers to speak about a "retention centre".
In the scramble to mock Mr Woolas, his key words were missed. The new detention centre – or retention centre – would be built beyond the line of British immigration controls in Calais docks. complete article
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