Stockholm - Several countries will next week discuss ways to stop gangs trafficking illegal immigrants into the European Union, Britain said yesterday. Measures to be discussed include sending intelligence units and immigration police to regions like the Western Balkans to help local authorities stem what threatens to become a tide of illegal immigrants and bogus asylum seekers.
Britain alone had 76,000 asylum requests last year, a 7 per cent rise on the previous year. "By working together we stand a better chance of tackling it," the British Home Secretary, Mr Jack Straw, told fellow EU ministers meeting in the Swedish capital.
The British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, and the Italian Prime Minister, Mr Guiliano Amato, propose closer links between EU states and Europol.