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Balcombe prepares for immigration demo
A field in Mid Sussex is expected to be the venue for an international demonstration against Britain's treatment of immigrants.
Several hundred campaigners from around the world including victims of torture and persecution were due to arrive at the site in Brantridge Lane, Balcombe, tomorrow (Thursday).
The field, opposite the Brantridge Park time share complex, attracted around 30 campaigners late on Sunday who began building a tented camp for demonstrators including installing toilets, water supplies, washing and cooking facilities.
Police were present but said the community was there legally with consent of the landowner.
The so-called No Border Camp is the first of its kind to take place in the UK. A No Border camp against the alleged worldwide persecution of refugees and immigrants took place in the Ukraine in August and a further one is expected on the US/Mexico border in November.
Ian Bros, a co-organiser of the Balcombe camp, said campaigners supported the free movement of people across all borders and intended to demonstrate peacefully and legally.
He said: "We are here for three days to set up and afterwards for three days to take everything down. The field is usually hay and is the farmer's livelehood and we have guaranteed to clean it up and take everything away, including litter."
The site is the second to be designated for the camp after a planned site in Salfords was ruled out.
The demonstrators, who are expected to remain on the site until Sunday, are objecting to a new detention centre, Brook House, which the immigration service is building at Gatwick Airport.
Brook House is expected to open next year and will be Britain's largest deportation centre housing 426 men and women. It is next to the Home Office's existing detention centre at Tinsley House, which accommodates up to 136 people at a time including children.
The Balcombe No Border Camp on farmland about a mile-and-a-half from the centre of the village, is expected to attract around 300 people from all over the country as well as other parts of Europe, Mexico, India and Africa.
It will be the site for four days of protests mainly in the Crawley and Gatwick areas including a march from Crawley up the A23 to Tinsley House on Saturday to coincide with a Transnational Day of Solidarity with refugees in detention around the world.
On Thursday demonstrators will be handing out leflets and newspapers in Crawley shopping centres and on Friday will descend on the Home Office's Border and Immigartion Agency in Croydon. Sunday, the last day of the event, has been designated for workshops at the camp in Balcombe.
Ardingly-based documentary maker Nick Broomfield's film Ghosts, about the Morecombe Bay cockle pickers, was shown on television two weeks ago and film maker Ken Loach's new film It's A Free World, about the supply and exploitation of migrants by UK businesses, is scheduled to be shown by Channel 4 at 9pm on Monday (September 24).
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Saturday 11 February 2012
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