The ferry crossing lasted four and a half hours. After 90 minutes the people in the lorry began banging on the walls and trying to force the vent and the doors open. No-one heard them and one by one they died as the oxygen in the confined space ran out and all that remained was carbon dioxide.

By chance two of the original total of 60 men and women in the lorry did survive. Their physical and mental suffering is barely imaginable. They were taken away to a police 'safe house' and are being held under armed guard until they recover sufficiently to be interrogated about the details of their journey. Once they have provided this evidence to the police, and possibly repeated it to a court, they will presumably be deported. The danger of the journey which brings an immigrant to Britain has never been a guarantee of leave to remain, as the man who survived the journey from India frozen to the underbelly of an aeroplane discovered. The dead have not yet been formally identified, although Kent police claim to have up to 42 provisional identifications. London lawyers, working with the Chinese community, say they are aware of at least eight people living in Britain who believe their relatives may be among the dead but are too frightened to come forward because the police and Immigration Service have said that if they do so their own immigration status will be scrutinised.
 
Carriers' liability
 
The 1999 Asylum and Immigration Act massively extended 'carriers' liability', a concept first introduced in 1987, when transport operators began to be held responsible for passengers who turned out to be illegal immigrants. The 1999 Act created a new civil penalty for road-hauliers, shipping firms, rail services or airlines which bring in illegal immigrants, even when they are unaware they are doing so.

In April Jack Straw jubilantly told parliament about the money the government was going to make from impounding a lorry containing 50 (live) immigrants. At a fine of £2,000 per 'clandestine', the government was set to boost its tough image in the face of Tory propaganda and net £100,000 at the same time. It remains to be seen if Dutch lorry driver Perry Wacker, who has been charged with manslaughter, will also be fined £120,000.
 
Media backs government line
 
The lack of outrage over these deaths is almost as horrifying as the deaths themselves. When the news broke on the morning of Monday 19 June, TV and radio dutifully reported 'the facts', as then known. As the day wore on, the added predictable government comment on the evils of trafficking and a little - sombre to suit the gravity of the moment - inter-party bickering about how Shadow Home Secretary Ann Widdecombe would have ensured that such a lorry never got onto the ferry in the first place. The government produced a Chinese 'community leader' and member of a Home Office race advisory committee to repeat the party line. By the time of Channel 4's 7pm news broadcast, one might have expected some debate about the immigrat ion laws, if only out of a journalistic sense of variety. So what was 'liberal' presenter Jon Snow's take on the subject? He asked the Home Office minister whether the government would be launching a propaganda offensive in China to inform would-be immigrants of how unwelcome they are here. And he suggested that a useful tool in putting this message across would be as yet unavailable footage of the bodies inside the lorry -'so far we have only seen the tomatoes'.
 
Cross-party consensus
 
Jack Straw's line - 'blame the evil traffickers entirely; don't blame us at all - let's now bring in more and tougher laws' - was echoed by MPs of all parties, who questioned whether £2,000 was a sufficient deterrent. Only Simon Hughes of the Liberal Democrats dared murmur almost apologetically that the lack of lawful ways to enter the country was a factor in the deaths, while he was as vitriolic as Ann Widdecombe in his desire to pursue the traffickers 'to the ends of the earth'.

So what about those left-wing MPs who have been so vocal at recent marches and meetings in opposition to the Asylum Act? Tony Benn was conspicuously absent or silent during the parliamentary debate following the deaths and Jeremy Corbyn could only muster asking whether it wasn't 'time that the world learned that people who are seeking to escape from political, social or economic tragedies and repression adopt desperate measures to get out?'
 
Immigration and right-wing economics
 
Outside the small ranks of left and anti-racist organisations the only dissenting voices raised against the view that the lessons of Dover were that controls should be tightened still further and European co-operation increased, came from an emerging libertarian current whose most vocal proponent is Nigel Harris, author of The new untouchables: immigration and the new world worker. Supporters of this view argue that immigration controls are bad for the economy and call on the government to rethink its policies in the light of the ageing population, the 'skills gap' and the availability of a cheap well-educated, computer-literate workforce in southeast Asia. In the May 2000 issue of Red Pepper, Harris argues that far from creating unemployment among British workers - the traditional far-right line - increased immigration will increase employment possibilities: 'In general, immigrants don't do the jobs the natives want (except if they're students on their uppers), so they don't displace native workers: there's no competition between the two. They don't steal native jobs nor drive down wages. 'In fact, the situation is the opposite: if a hospital cannot recruit enough workers to do the unskilled jobs - porters, cleaners, laundry and canteen workers, security guards - it is impossible for the nurses, doctors, managers to work. So if you cut the number of immigrant workers, you increase native unemployment... 'But is it right to allow in immigrants to do the lousy jobs the natives refuse? Are we not protecting, even encouraging, the worst kinds of exploitation? On the surface this seems a much stronger argument. Yet it also turns out to be wrong. To stop exploitation, we are stopping willing workers getting work and increasing the unemployment of the natives.' (Red Pepper)

The day after the Dover massacre Guardian journalist Alan Travis called for an 'immigration policy based on... economic needs rather than... foreign policy objectives or asylum sympathies'. He dismissed the argument against poor countries of skilled workers so they can service the rich nations as of 'marginal' importance, citing the global value of remittances sent to poor nations by rich ones as $65 billion a year, $20 billion more than official global overseas aid expenditure.

While Travis calls for selective lifting of controls and Harris for their abolition, Harris also sings the praises of a remittance economy, claiming that the end of fetters on migration would allow such an economy to boom and would create 'a serious possibility of a real attack on world poverty' and, he is hopeful, 'the decline of the nation state'. This is pie in the sky. Socialists support the free movement of labour, but to argue that the 'freedom' of the populations of poor nations to work in rich ones and send home money earned their will transform the parasitic relationship between oppressor and oppressed states is nonsense.

While remittances, like aid, may alleviate short-term poverty for some people in the oppressed nations, a global economy based upon them simply shores up imperialist domination still further. Skilled workers from Asia will be used as a reserve army of labour in just the same way their grandparents' generation were used to do unskilled and semi-skilled jobs in the 50s. If they outlive their usefulness, they will be told to go. Such a policy is no less racist or class-driven than its predecessors and the murderous and vicious nature of today's immigration and asylum laws should not lead socialists to embrace it as an alternative. Neither Travis nor Harris question the right of imperialist economies to dominate the world in a way which c ompels the workers of poor countries to seek work abroad. Despite Harris' anti-poverty rhetoric, neither envisages the need for redistribution of wealth other than via remittances, and revolutionary struggle to redefine relations between imperialist and non-imperialist nations is definitely not on their agenda.
 
A fitting memorial
 
In stark contrast to the Australian government's response to the deaths of 15 people in a hostel fire the same week as the Chinese men and women perished, no state-funded public memorial will be erected to commemorate the wasted lives of the 58 immigrants. The only memorial events were organised by a coalition of anti-racist and religious organisations who held a vigil outside Downing Street followed by a remembrance meeting on 12 July.

A fitting tribute to the dead would be the building of a strong, united movement against the racism of the British government. A movement which combines the provision of material support for immigrants and refugees with the understanding that in an imperialist nation like Britain immigration laws are by their nature racist and oppressive and that opposition to them must be opposition not simply to the individual laws but to their basis, which is the imperialist relationship between oppressor and oppressed nations.
 
 
VICTORY FOR HIKMET BOZAT!
 
On the morning of Friday 23 June Kurdish political prisoner Hikmet Bozat went to his education class as normal. Ten minutes into the class he was summoned to an office, given a brown paper envelope and told he was being released on parole licence. The envelope contained documents granting him indefinite leave to remain in Britain as a refugee. Hikmet had been imprisoned in 1993, following a trial in which he was charged, together with Cafer Kovaycin and Servet Ozen, with participating in fire-bomb attacks on Turkish targets in London.

Cafer and Hikmet were sentenced to 15 years' imprisonment each, reduced on appeal in 1996 to 12 years. Servet Ozen was initially sentenced to serve 12 years but the appeal court took into account his youth and reduced the sentence to eight years. All three were additionally told that they would be deported to Turkey at the end of their sentences; however in Servet's case this was overturned at appeal. He was released at the end of 1998. In 1999 Hikmet reached the halfway point in his sentence and applied for parole. This was granted by the Parole Board but this did not result in his release, merely in his being transferred from the custody of the Prison Service to that of the Immigration and Nationality Directorate. It took over six months of legal wrangling to force the state that Hikmet had an extremely 'well founded fear of persecution' if deported to Turkey and to grant him refugee status.

Cafer Kovaycin is still in prison, with 18 months left to serve. Following Hikmet's victory, the chances of the deportation order against Cafer being overturned are greatly increased, and he has added medical grounds for avoiding deportation. Shortly after he was sentenced, Cafer was brutally attacked and burned with boiling oil in what was clearly a politically motivated attack. He has still not recovered from his injuries and continues to require medical treatment. Soon after his release Hikmet Bozat spoke to FRFI. He told us: 'It is difficult to describe how I feel now I have been released but one thing is for sure - I was an innocent person, a scapegoat. Once I had come to terms with this I tried to spend my time in prison studying for the future and I took an Open University Social Sciences degree, which I plan to complete now I am out.

'In prison I tried to communicate with everyone, regardless of colour, nationality or political beliefs. I explained to people why I was there and sometimes debated with them. I did my best to help people wherever I could and I think I managed to give something to some of them. In return I received support from other prisoners.

'I never felt as though I was in prison in my mind - my heart and soul were always free. So although they locked me up, mentally I was still outside with my family and my friends. 'My family helped me a lot; so did my close friends, and both my family and I received support which was indescribable from individuals, from organisations, from your newspaper and from other places. I believe that without that support I would not be here. The Turkish system is anti-democratic. They are killing Kurdish people daily. I could easily have been one of them, but because of the help I have received I can now stay in this country until the Kurdish question is solved politically. In that sense I am still not free because Kurdistan is not free. 'I will do my best now to contribute peacefully to the Kurdish question, to support the struggles of other nations and to contribute to the community in Britain in a political sense. For example, elderly people here deserve better; the education system is not satisfactory; people deserve better health care, education and living standards. If I can help towards that I will do so. I am ready to contribute whatever I can.'
 
VICTORY TO THE ANGEL HEIGHTS 7 - END DISPERSAL NOW!
 
In April the government began full implementation of the 'dispersal' policy it had piloted over the preceding six months. By May 6,000 refugees had been sent to towns outside London and the south-east. They are housed in hostels, many run by housing charities which have been falling over themselves to bid for 'partnersip' deals with local authorities. Conditions vary, with the worst hostels akin to open prisons.
 
On 10 May asylum-seekers dispersed from Kent to Angel Heights hostel in Newcastle upon Tyne demonstrated against the terrible quality of the hostel food and a reduction in their living allowance from £7 a week to £5.

Angel Heights houses 250 asylum-seekers, the overwhelming majority of whom are Iraqi Kurds. They are not allowed visitors, their mail is intercepted and they are subjected to a curfew. Newcastle City Council, which is supposed to provide support for dispersed refugees, has not provided any interpreters, legal advice, English classes or clothing. There had already been repeated protests against this treatment and in March the refugees staged a two-day hungerstrike, which resulted in a short visit by a representative of Dover Social Services, who came to 'hear their grievances' but did not bring an interpreter.

The hostel management claimed 40 windows were broken and furniture and crockery destroyed during the 10 May protest. The asylum-seekers deny this. The police arrested seven elected representatives, identified by the management as having negotiated with them on previous occasions, irrespective of their participation in the demonstration on that day. In normal circumstances someone who is arrested on public order charges would be freed on bail. However, Angel Heights refused to accept them back and Kent County Council refused to find alternative accommodation; the police refused to let them be bailed to friends' houses and the Home Office refused to intervene at all. It took three and a half weeks negotiation, legal action and a fax campaign by supporters to force Kent CC to provide another hostel address so the court would grant bail.

Angel heights is not unique. Similar hostels exist in Coventry, Manchester, Birmingham, Glasgow and other cities. Some refugees fear dispersal enough to refuse to leave the south-east, preferring to reject the offer of 'support' and depend on their own communities. The organiser of a London Kurdish community centre told a recent meeting that eight asylum-seekers were living in a caravan in the centre's grounds rather than face dispersal. While dispersal at present is mainly to cities, the government has more far-reaching plans. Much was made in the press of the 'rural revolt' in a tiny Somerset village where housing charity Kaleidoscope hopes to open a 74-place asylum-seeker hostel. The local council, sensibly, rejected the application on the grounds that the remote rural location made it impossible to provide adequate support facilities. The council was cheered on both by xenophobes and bigots who opposed the idea of foreigners invading their leafy village, and by the forgotten rural poor and elderly, who were understandably angered that, if it went ahead, the hostel would have to be provided with transport, while their local bus service was virtually non-existent. A public enquiry is now underway. Whether Kaleidoscope wins or loses, the exercise will have succeeded in stirring up racial hatred and hostility, and endangered the safety of refugees placed in isolated areas.

Germany has had a dispersal policy since 1982 and it is a criminal offence for 'dispersed' immigrants to cross the border from one county to another. If the dispersal policy is not defeated in its early stages, this will be the shape of things to come in Britain.
 
ACROSS EUROPE - IMMIGRANTS ORGANISE TO DEFEND THEIR RIGHTS
 
Spain
 
In February inhabitants of the southern Spanish town of El Ejido physically attacked the large immigrant community, which numbers 15-20,000. The attacks on immigrants and the burning of their homes, cars and businesses was encouraged by the local mayor, a member of Spain's ruling Popular Party (PP) and carried out by members of the PP, the local police and visiting fascists. The immigrants, working in large vegetable plantations and mostly living in primitive accommodation without running water, electricity or transport, reacted by forming their own organisation to defend themselves. A strike quickly brought some concessions from the authorities and very belated support, for the first time ever, from Eurocommunist and social democratic trade unions.

Further support came from other sections of the Spanish left and trade union movement when 200 immigrants occupied part of the nearby city of Almeira's trade union building. On May Day the immigrant organisation called for a united demonstration, which was attended by 4,000 people, while only 1,500 attended the 'official' demonstration. Support for the immigrants' struggle is now growing in other parts of Spain.
 
Germany
 
Inspired by a similar campaign in France, the 'kein Mensch is illegal' (no one is illegal) campaign was founded in 1997 to highlight the problems faced by refugees in Germany. Kurds from Turkey played a prominent role in the initial stages, following their criminalisation by the German state, which had declared the PKK a terrorist organisation. During the 1998 federal elections a 'Caravan for the rights of refugees and immigrants' visited 44 towns under the slogan 'We have no vote but we have a voice'. Mini conferences were held with discussion in three to five languages. During the 1999 EU and G8 summits refugees from Nigeria, Togo, Cameroon, Kurdistan, Sri Lanka and Peru staged a 14-day hungerstrike highlighting the rich countries' responsibility for making them refugees. This year the Caravan traversed Germany again, ending with an 11-day conference at Jena. Representatives of British anti-racist organisations attended and an initiative has been launched by the Campaign Against Racism and Fascism for a British 'Caravan' in September/October this year. More information about this on 0207 837 1450
 
Britain
 
Several arrests were made on 18 July on a BA flight from Heathrow to Frankfurt. Passengers resorted to civil disobedience to prevent the forced deportation of Salim Rambo, a 23 year-old Zairean refugee. The flight was delayed for over two hours and the deportation prevented. The CAGE network leafleted passengers boarding the flight, telling them about Mr Rambo's presence on the plane. This leafleting was part of long weekend of action by CAGE, which included an occupation of the site of a proposed women's prison and scaling of the fence at Harmondsworth Detention Centre. To contact CAGE page 07669 167 489.