UK, France agree on 3-year deal to stop migrant crossings

PARIS

Britain and France have agreed a new three-year deal to stop undocumented migrants making the risky journey across the Channel in small boats, the two sides announced.

Under the deal, France pledged to increase law enforcement on the coast by more than half to fight irregular migration to Britain, reaching 1,400 officers by 2029.

Britain, meanwhile, will provide up to 766 million euros ($897 million) in funding, though nearly a quarter of that will be conditional.

The cross-Channel neighbors have wrangled for months over renewing the Sandhurst treaty, which sets out the U..K's financial contribution to French efforts to stop migrants attempting the perilous sea crossing to Britain.

The U.K. has accused France of doing too little to prevent would-be asylum seekers from setting off from French shores, with smugglers and migrants taking ever-greater risks to avoid detection.

As a result, London insisted it would only renew the Sandhurst treaty, first signed in 2018, extended in 2023 and set to expire this year, if it could impose conditions on how British money is used by the French government.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Anglo-French work had "already stopped tens of thousands of crossings" and that "this historic agreement means we can go further: Ramping up intelligence, surveillance and boots on the ground to protect Britain's borders."

According to a French Interior Ministry document on the accord, if the new measures do not deliver "sufficient results, based on a joint annual assessment, the funding will be redirected to new actions.

Even if the conditional portion is not paid, however, the U.K.'s core contribution of 580 million euros still represents a 40-million-euro hike on what it paid under the last treaty.