FRANCE: Up to 100 Iraqi Kurd and Afghan migrants yesterday defied police orders to end their occupation of a church in the French port of Calais, the last stop for many on a stowaway route to Britain.
A dozen riot police ringed the small Saint Pierre Saint Paul church as the stand-off went into its fifth night.
But the authorities have so far held off on threats to storm the church as some migrants inside warned that would spark a bloodbath.
"If policemen come inside we will kill self and fight self," Mr Karwan Ahmad, a Kurdish occupant, said.
Another Iraqi Kurd said: "We don't want to go out and even if the policemen come in, we will fight to stay. People don't want to leave. They don't want to ask for asylum in France. They don't think they'll get a positive answer in France."
Many of those inside have made hazardous journeys across Europe heading for the nearby Sangatte refugee camp, known as a base for migrants to sneak through the Channel Tunnel into Britain after stowing away in trucks and on trains.
But Sangatte was closed to new arrivals last week as part of a deal under which Britain is tightening its asylum laws to discourage migrants, and this left dozens of newcomers with nowhere to go.
There are no toilets inside the church and as hygiene conditions worsened, refugee groups sent negotiators into the building to appeal to those inside to end their occupation and apply for asylum in France.
Father Jean-Pierre Boutoille, leader of the Saint Pierre Saint Paul church, said he understood some of the Iraqi Kurds were now ready to apply for asylum in France, although others were still determined to get to Britain.
"There is a process under which France could make a request to Britain to examine their applications [for asylum\]. That is what we are looking at now," Ms Helene Flautre, a French Greens member involved in the negotiations, told French television.
She was referring to a European Union provision under which one country may examine an asylum application at the request of another state for humanitarian reasons.
France traditionally does not send migrants back to their home countries if they come from conflict zones, which in the past have included Iraq, Afghanistan and Kosovo.
But many migrants believe Britain will look more favourably on their applications. Others say they simply want to join family or friends living in established communities there.
The Red Cross-run Sangatte camp is due to shut for good by April next year. The 1,800 people still there are being sorted into those with genuine grounds for asylum and others who will be offered €2,000 each to return home.
French Red Cross president Mr Marc Gentilini said he believed some groups involved in events at the church were exploiting the migrants to wage an ideological battle against France's centre-right government, which has taken a hard line on law and order.
"This is a delicate operation at a humanitarian and political level," he told the French daily Liberation.
"People should not use people who are wandering the streets to wage an ideological battle ... some associations that are not necessarily charitable ones are stirring things up," he added.
Mr Gentilini did not elaborate. There have been media reports that known members of human trafficking gangs are among those inside the church.
Britain, facing a steep rise in the number of people seeking asylum after arriving from France as stowaways, took France to task for turning a blind eye to the migrants in Calais, and demanded the closure of the Sangatte camp.
Interior Minister Mr Nicolas Sarkozy agreed in July to close the camp in return for the adoption of tougher asylum laws by Britain.
A new asylum bill is to become law after approval by the House of Lords last week. - (Reuters)