The Calais Jungle (known officially as Camp de la Lande) was a refugee and immigrant encampment in the vicinity of Calais, France, that existed from January 2015 to October 2016. There had been other camps known as "jungles" in previous years, but this particular shanty town drew global media attention during the peak of the European migrant crisis in 2015, when its population grew rapidly. Migrants stayed at the camp while they attempted to enter the United Kingdom, or while they waited for their French asylum claims to be processed.
The camp was located on a former landfill site to the east of Calais. By July 2015, it had 3,000 inhabitants and continued to grow. Although estimates of the number of migrants differed, a Help Refugees (now Choose Love) census gave a figure of 8,143 people just before the camp's demolition in October 2016. As well as residences, the Jungle contained shops, restaurants, hairdressers, schools, places of worship and a boxing club.
The Government of France initially tolerated the camp, later opting to rehouse 1,500 migrants in shipping containers to be used as shelters on the north-eastern side of the site. In February 2016, they evicted the southern sector of the Jungle and there were several arrests. The Jungle received local support and international solidarity from activists, artists, intellectuals and grassroots aid organisations. The camp was completely cleared and demolished in October 2016. According to Government plans, 6,400 migrants would be moved to 280 temporary reception centres around France. There were concerns over the fate of 200 unaccompanied children and Human Rights Watch published a report in 2017 stating that up to 1,000 migrants were still living in the Calais region. While there is no longer a camp like the Jungle in Calais, a sizeable number of migrants are still present.
Context
Migrants based in Calais were attempting to enter the United Kingdom via the Port of Calais or the Channel Tunnel by stowing away on lorries, ferries, cars, or trains. Some migrants were attempting to return to the United Kingdom having once lived there, whilst others were attempting to enter the British labour market to find under-the-table work, which is more difficult in France. Some migrants lived in the camp while seeking asylum in France, a choice they made because the French system did not provide for them while their claim was being processed, leaving them homeless for the duration.Francesca Ansaloni, 'Deterritorialising the Jungle: Understanding the Calais camp through its orderings' in Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space (25/02/20) doi.org/10.1177/2399654420908597 One migrant from Egypt, a politics graduate, told The Guardian that he had "paid $3,000 (£2,000) to leave Egypt, risked my life on a boat to Italy spending days at sea" and that in one month he had tried 20 times to reach England; another, an Eritrean woman with a one-year-old child, had paid €2,500 (£1,825) – and her husband the same – to sail to Italy, but her husband had drowned during the journey.'At night it's like a horror movie' – inside Calais's official shantytown. Angelique Chrisafis, The Guardian, 6 April 2015. Retrieved 25 May 2019. Migrants risk their lives when they try to climb aboard or travel on lorries, occasionally falling off and breaking bones; some fatalities en route are also recorded. In September 2016, workers began building a barrier, dubbed "The Great Wall Of Calais", to block refugees from accessing a highway where they could stow away on vehicles bound for Britain.
Migrants have gathered around Calais since at least the 1990s.N. Bajekal, 'Inside Calais's Deadly Migrant Crisis (01/08/15) in Time A refugee centre opened in 1999 and had been administered by the French Red Cross at Sangatte, but rapidly became overcrowded. After the Sangatte facility was closed in November 2002 by Nicolas Sarkozy (then the French Minister of the Interior) under pressure from the UK government, a "jungle" camp was established in the woods around the Port of Calais, along with various other camps that sprung up around the city before being torn down by the authorities. The large camp lasted until April 2009, when the French authorities launched a raid, arresting 190 people and using bulldozers to destroy tents. By July 2009, the camp had been re-established, and the BBC estimated it held around 800 inhabitants.Migrant squalor in Calais 'jungle'. Emma-Jane Kirby, BBC News, 2 July 2009. Retrieved 24 June 2015. French authorities closed down the camp in a September 2009 dawn raid and detained 276 people.Dawn raid on Calais "Jungle". The Connexion, 22 September 2009. Retrieved 24 June 2015.French police round up 200 migrants in Calais swoop. Agence France-Presse, 21 April 2009. Retrieved 24 June 2015. Conditions in these camps were poor, typically without proper sanitary or washing facilities and accommodation consisting of tents and improvised shelters. Food was supplied by charity kitchens. The French authorities faced a dilemma of addressing humanitarian needs without attracting additional migrants. The notion of humanitarian aid provision being a pull factor to the area has been contested by academics.Violaine Carrère, 'Sangatte, un symbole d'impuissance ' in Plein droit 2003/3 (n° 58)Maud Angliviel, 'La relative consécration d'obligations étatiques dans la « jungle » calaisienne Dignité de la personne humaine ' (2015) in La Revue des droits de l'hommeJérôme Lèbre, '« Appel d'air », attractivité libérale et inhospitalité absolue' in Lignes 2019/3 (n° 60)Jean-Pierre Alaux, 'Calais vaut bien quelques requiem ' in Plein droit 2015/1 (n° 104)
Smaller camps continued to be set up and evicted over the following years, and local volunteers provided aid to migrants. After a visit to the city by French interior minister Bernard Cazeneuve in September 2014, Cazeneuve and the mayor of Calais Natacha Bouchart agreed on opening a day centre in Calais for migrants and a night shelter specifically for women and children.Agence France-Presse, 'Calais mayor threatens to block port if UK fails to help deal with migrants ' (03/09/14) in The Guardian It was this decision that led to the opening of the Jules Ferry Centre in January of the following year, around which the camp expanded. In December 2014, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees said the conditions in Calais were "totally unacceptable". In partnership with local associations, the UNHCR also reported that 15 people, including young women and teenagers, had died at the border during 2014.
In January 2015, the government set up an official day centre, initially consisting of three military tents in the car park of a former children's holiday camp, the Jules Ferry Centre.R. Mulholland, 'Calais opens first migrant camp since Sangatte closed ' (15/01/15) in The Daily Telegraph Located on the eastern outskirts of the city, this was the first permanent site for migrants in the area since the camp at Sangatte. It was run by La Vie Active and was set up as a place from which food could be distributed, with overnight accommodation for up to 500 women and children added a few months later. Migrants were pushed towards this site through the dismantling of other encampments around the city and the area around the Jules Ferry Centre became a "tolerated zone" where migrants camped. It is this site that developed into the Calais Jungle.
Location and name The Calais Jungle was located on a former landfill site in a Seveso zone. The land had been polluted by industrial waste and had been designated a Natura 2000 protected nature habitat. From 2000 onwards, the name "jungle" has been used by migrants to describe many encampments and shanty towns around Calais. The use of the word to describe encampments is thought to derive from the Pashto word "dzjangal" which means a forest or wood. The moniker "Calais Jungle" is now most associated with this particular camp that existed from January 2015 to October 2016, located on the eastern edge of Calais, under away from the Port of Calais and next to the N216 bypass, used by vehicles approaching or leaving the ferry terminal. It was tolerated by the French authorities who officially referred to it as the Camp de la Lande ("Lande" meaning "heath" or "moor", referring to the geography and location of the site, a sandy area of flats and dunes outside the perimeter of the city).
Statistics
By September 2014, The Guardian estimated that there were 1,300 migrants in Calais, mostly from Eritrea, Somalia and Syria. In 2015, during the peak of the European migrant crisis, the numbers began to grow. Migrants arrived from Afghanistan, Darfur, Iraq and other conflict zones. By July 2015, The Telegraph reported that the "new jungle" had 3,000 inhabitants.
Médecins du Monde stated in 2015 that 62% of the migrants in Calais were young men with an average age of 33, with an increase in the number unaccompanied children (517 in 2014, eight times more than in 2011). Many migrants later moved to smaller camps near Calais and Dunkirk. As of November 2015, there were an estimated 6,000 migrants living in Calais, policed by over 1,000 officers.A. Zemouri, 'La "jungle" de Calais inquiète les autorités ' (21/10/15) in Le Point That winter, the number of arrivals decreased while a number of migrants left the camp, such as 3,569 who were "welcomed to France".M. Solletty, 'INFOGRAPHIE. L'explosion du nombre de migrants à Calais en un graphique ' (02/09/16) on France Info At the end of February 2016, the BBC noted that there were differing figures for the population: "Calais officials say it houses 3,700, while Help Refugees puts it at 5,497". Aid organisations put discrepancies between their and the authorities' figures down to different counting methods and a reluctance from migrants to speak to border police.Full Fact, 'Counting the number of migrants in the Calais 'jungle' ' (31/08/16)
Refugee Rights Data Project (RRDP, later known as Refugee Rights Europe) released a report in April 2016 called The Long Wait: Filling the data gaps relating to refugees and displaced people in the Calais camp. It stated that 75.9% of the 870 refugees surveyed said they had experienced police violence, a category including physical and sexual violence, verbal abuse and misuse of tear gas. A similar figure (76.7%) reported health issues resulting from living in the Jungle. According to The Long Wait, at the time of the report 71.6% of the approximately 5,500 residents had been in the camp for three to six months. About 78 people had been there for more than a year and around 205 women lived in the camp at this time (3.2% of the population).
A large fight between 200 and 300 migrants from Afghanistan and Sudan broke out at the camp in late May 2016, resulting in 40 injuries (33 migrants, 5 aid workers and 2 police officers), of which 3 were serious (including a stabbing).Dozens injured at fight at Calais 'Jungle' migrant camp , Deutsche Welle (27 May 2016). Two hundred police officers, seventy firefighters and eleven ambulances responded to the scene; French authorities opened an investigation. At the time, Deutsche Welle estimated that 4,000 to 5,000 people lived in the camp. During the summer, the population of the camp surpassed the highest number of the previous year. According to a July 2016 census by Help Refugees, the camp was populated by 7,307 migrants, of which 761 were minors with the population growing by 50 people a day on average. By September, the state estimated the population at 6,901, while local non-governmental organisations (NGOs) put it at 9,000 – a figure accepted by Mayor Bouchart. It was estimated that the population reached 10,000 before the camp's demolition. Help Refugees' final count put the population of the camp at 8,143 in October 2016. More than 1,000 police were deployed during the final eviction.