Reform UK proposes military-led operation to stop asylum seekers

UK’s right-wing Reform UK party said on Monday that if elected, it would stop asylum seekers with what it ​called the largest military operation in the Channel since World ‌War Two, as it faces falling popularity and questions over its funding.

Pointing to a migration crisis in Spain’s North African enclave of Ceuta, Reform leader ​Nigel Farage announced a tougher immigration policy that he said ​would see asylum seekers who arrive in small boats intercepted ⁠and returned to France.

Reform said the policy, dubbed “Operation Fortress”, would make ​the UK’s border impenetrable.

“Under a Reform government, within a fortnight, there would ​be no more boats,” Farage told reporters at a press conference.

Farage has suffered a difficult few months with his party losing its lead in national opinion polls ​for the first time in over a year after a ​series of revelations about gifts and donations to senior party figures.

Labor accused Reform of ‌repackaging ⁠old policies on immigration to deflect attention from questions about its finances, while some experts questioned whether the party’s latest proposals were workable.

Andrew Fox, a former paratrooper and a senior associate fellow at ​the Henry Jackson Society ​think-tank, said ⁠the plan “sounds magnificent, provided you know nothing about ships, sailors, France or the law”.

Fox said Britain could ​not move warships into French territorial waters, seize ​boats, or ⁠disembark passengers in Calais without French permission.

“This is the gap at the centre of the policy,” he said.

Prime Minister Andy Burnham on ⁠Sunday promised “relentless” ​action on stopping asylum seekers after ​new figures showed that more than 2,000 people had arrived in Britain since he became ​leader two weeks ago.