The Home Office explains this trend by the recent tightening of immigration legislation, the abolition of benefits for those who did not apply immediately upon arrival in the country, and also by the fact that London has stopped granting asylum to citizens of so-called “safe countries.” In particular, the British police are demanding to limit the influx of immigrants.
Sherlock Holmes did not have to fight international mafia: transnational criminal community is a new phenomenon for England. According to one of the police chiefs, Chris Fox, it is linked to the influx of immigrants and refugees: “Criminals deliver these people to our country in an organized manner. Newcomers are immediately inclined to various types of criminal activity - prostitution, drug smuggling, and so on. The criminals themselves can easily blend into this crowd of migrants and move across borders.”
In support of his words, the “Daily Mail” newspaper tells how certain Igor Koptsov, who had been deported from Britain twice, and Alexander Govorukhin, who was queuing for asylum in the country, smuggled illegal immigrants. From this pair, linked, according to the newspaper, to the Russian mafia, the police confiscated 38 fake passports.
And the “Sun” newspaper experimentally found out that passports are not needed at all to enter the British Isles and live at the expense of the state. Its correspondent, a pure-blooded Anglo-Saxon named Oliver Harley, pretended to be a Russian journalist from Moldova. Appearing unshaven at the refugee reception center near London, he said in broken language that he was allegedly persecuted by local authorities in his homeland. Fleeing, he illegally went to Romania and reached England in a camper van. An ordinary matter, the official sighed, and without any checks gave him a ticket to a new, English life. On the same day, the disguised reporter had free shelter, food stamps, transport, and medical care. He was never searched, yet he could have smuggled weapons.
Traditionally, British “bobbies” patrol the streets unarmed, not expecting to have to engage in a gunfight. But, as Chris Fox noted, people come to Britain seeking asylum from countries where carrying a blade or a gun is almost a cultural feature.
One involuntarily imagines a man from the Caucasus in a national costume adorned with daggers. This, according to the police officer, is just one example of the danger that the wave of real and imaginary refugees brings to British society.
Fox's bluntness and threatening tone drew criticism from organizations that help those fleeing persecution in their homeland. Lee Daines, an activist from one of these groups, claims that refugees are no more prone to offending than the local public. “We are concerned that the issue of asylum is being given political significance in the United Kingdom. The public is misinformed about the situation in this area, and as a result, the newcomers themselves often become victims - this aspect is more important than the claim that immigration supposedly generates crime,” the human rights activist noted.