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| Albanians on boats in their way to UK through North France (archive) |
Prime Minister Edi Rama called on Albanian citizens to stop crossing the English Channel in small boats, but The Telegraph writes that about 2,000 people have gathered in the north of France ready to make the dangerous journey.
In its article, the British media quoted the head of the Albanian government, who told young Albanians that they should invest their money in rural tourism businesses, thus earning more than they could earn in Great Britain.
"The Albanian government will provide financial support to support such plans amid concerns that the number of young Albanians seeking to cross the Channel is increasing," he said.
Border Force officials say Albanians now account for up to 60 percent of arrivals, 100 times more than last year's number from the Balkan country.
A further 2,000 Albanians are said to have reached northern France and are now living in makeshift camps or crowding into B&Bs in Dunkirk and Calais before making the crossing.
Last week, Albania's parliament unanimously backed a new "memorandum" with the United Kingdom to allow its police officers sent to Britain to share criminal and biometric information on Albanian Channel migrants in a bid to speed up their deportation to the Balkans.
Rama suggested that the £20,000 or £30,000 people were paying traffickers to come to the UK, with government support, could enable them to build "agritourism" businesses based on their parents' or grandparents' smallholdings.
"You can make a lot more money than you could from a normal job in the UK if you don't get involved with criminal networks that may lure you with stories of more money but ultimately lead to hell," he said, Euronews Albania reports.
Criminal gangs and the cocaine trade
Law enforcement agencies are concerned about the influx of Albanians, whose criminal gangs dominate the cocaine drug trade in the south of England and have expanded into cannabis cultivation by adapting aeroponic techniques developed in Albania to grow the plants.
It is estimated that by the end of this month, around 9,000 Albanians may have reached Great Britain. Overall, nearly 4,700 migrants have already crossed the Channel this month, bringing the total so far this year to 29,716, compared with 28,526 for all of 2021 and 8,400 in 2020.