UK sanctions 25 targets involved in alleged people smuggling
The individuals and entities targeted on Wednesday include a small boat supplier in Asia and gang leaders based in the Balkans and North Africa. 'Middlemen' putting cash through the hawala money transfer system in the Middle East, which is used in payments linked to Channel crossings, are also targeted.
It is unclear how effective the new sanctions regime will be, since British authorities can only freeze assets that are in the UK, and most of the smugglers are based elsewhere.
Foreign Secretary David Lammy said on Wednesday that it was a 'landmark moment in the government's work to tackle organised immigration crime [and] reduce irregular migration to the UK'.
'From Europe to Asia, we are taking the fight to the people smugglers who enable irregular migration, targeting them wherever they are in the world and making them pay for their actions,' he added.
The move follows legislation being introduced under the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill to ramp up enforcement powers for police forces and partners to investigate and prosecute people smugglers.
As part of the new sanctions regime, which was introduced two days ago, the government can now freeze assets, impose travel bans and block access to the country's financial system for individuals and entities involved in enabling irregular migration, without relying on criminal or counterterrorism laws.
Albanian Bledar Lala, leader of the Belgian operations of an organised smuggling group, and a company in China that advertised small boats for people smuggling on an online marketplace are among those sanctioned.
The number of refugees and migrants arriving on England's southern coast via small boats from northern France is a major political issue for Prime Minister Keir Starmer's Labour government, which has seen the far-right Reform UK party make significant political gains with a hardline anti-immigration platform.
Starmer recently agreed to migration deals with France and Germany.
Earlier this month, Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron agreed to a 'one in, one out' deal in which refugees and migrants arriving by small boats would be returned to France in exchange for an equal number of migrants being able to come to the UK from France via a new legal route, which would be fully documented and subject to strict security checks.
Last week, Germany and the UK signed a historic defence treaty, in which Berlin committed to making facilitating the smuggling of refugees and migrants to the UK a criminal offence. The law change, which is expected to be passed by the end of the year, will give German authorities more powers to investigate and take action against warehouses and storage facilities used by smugglers to conceal small boats for Channel crossings.
Some 37,000 people crossed the English Channel in 2024, and more than 22,000 so far in 2025 – an increase of about 50 percent from the same period last year. Dozens of people have died attempting the journey.
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India accuses US, EU of Russia trade double standards: Who is right?
India on Monday hit back at the United States and European Union over sanctions, tariffs and threats that it has faced from them in recent days over its purchase of Russian oil amid the war on Ukraine. New Delhi accused the US and EU of themselves importing substantial volumes of goods – including energy in the case of Europe – from Russia, while punishing India. India's strongest pushback yet, against mounting pressure from Washington and Brussels on trade and its ties with Russia, came hours after US President Donald Trump threatened to significantly increase tariffs he had previously announced against Indian goods. Trump had last week imposed a 25 percent tariff on imports from India, which is expected to kick in from August 7. In a Monday social media post, however, he said he 'will be substantially raising the Tariff paid by India to the USA' because of India's imports of Russian crude. 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'Like any major economy, India will take all necessary measures to safeguard its national interests and economic security,' Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said, in words that suggest New Delhi is in no mood to back down. But Jaiswal also directly pushed back against suggestions from the US and EU that India – in buying large volumes of Russian crude – had acted in a way that broke with the West's own behaviour. 'In fact, India began importing from Russia because traditional supplies were diverted to Europe after the outbreak of the conflict,' Jaiswal said, referring to Russia's full-fledged invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. 'The United States at that time actively encouraged such imports by India for strengthening global energy markets' stability,' he added. He said India's decision to import Russian oil was 'meant to ensure predictable and affordable energy costs to the Indian consumer'. 'However, it is revealing that the very nations criticising India are themselves indulging in trade with Russia,' he added. The EU, he said, had traded more with Russia in goods in 2024 than India had. 'European imports of LNG in 2024, in fact, reached a record 16.5 million tonnes, surpassing the last record of 15.21 million tonnes in 2022,' Jaiswal said. The US, meanwhile, 'continues to import from Russia uranium hexafluoride for its nuclear industry, palladium for its EV industry, fertilisers as well as chemicals,' the spokesperson said. India's response is not surprising, said Biswajit Dhar, a trade economist who has been involved with multiple Indian trade negotiations. 'The aggressiveness that the Trump administration has shown – there had to be some reaction from India,' he told Al Jazeera. 'For a sovereign country to hear this kind of a threat from another country is unacceptable.' How significant are the US, EU sanctions and tariffs against India? India's pushback reflects just how much is at stake for its economy. The US is India's largest export destination: Americans bought $87bn worth of Indian goods in 2024. By contrast, India imported $41bn worth of US goods last year, leading to a large $46bn trade deficit for the US. Trump's earlier threat of 25 percent tariffs on Indian goods was already threatening to dramatically disrupt that trade. His announcement of even higher tariffs could bleed India's export revenue further. Brussels' decision to bar the import of refined petroleum sourced from Russian crude could also batter the profits of Indian refineries. According to market intelligence firm S&P Global, Indian exports of petroleum products to Europe have jumped from $5.9bn in 2019 to $20.5bn, largely because of India's ability to buy subsidised Russian oil, refine it, and then sell it to the West. 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Total Russia-US trade in 2024 stood at $5.2bn, according to the US Trade Representative's office – though the numbers are down significantly from 2021, when their trade in goods stood at $36bn. Given this backdrop, the Indian foreign ministry was 'absolutely right to call out the US and EU', Jayati Ghosh, an economics professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, told Al Jazeera. 'They are still importing from Russia. They're allowed to do it, we are not. That's ridiculous.' Is this all a trade negotiating tactic? Some Indian experts believe that the threats and tariffs from Trump are bargaining measures aimed at securing a trade deal with India that is favourable to the US. The two countries have been locked in negotiations over a trade agreement to minimise Trump's tariffs but have yet to agree on a pact, even though India has cut tariffs on several US imports. A key sticking point is agriculture, where India has long imposed high tariffs to protect its farm sector, which represents about half of the country's population. 'The way the Trump administration has been demanding that India open its market to US agri-business – that's a no-go for India,' Dhar said. 'Our small farmers will face a serious adverse situation; so it's economically and politically completely unacceptable to India.' Ghosh echoed those sentiments. 'There's no question of giving in on agriculture,' she said. 'In India, you cannot give in and allow US heavily subsidised multinational conglomerates to invade our markets, when a majority of our population still depends on agriculture for a livelihood.' But in recent weeks, Trump has also tried to ramp up pressure on Russia to agree to a ceasefire deal with Ukraine, and choking Moscow's oil exports would make it harder for Russian President Vladimir Putin to sustain his economy. 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Al Jazeera
a day ago
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Far-right figure Tommy Robinson arrested for train station assault in UK
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Al Jazeera
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A top United States official has accused India of financing Russia's war in Ukraine by buying oil from Moscow, as the Trump administration ramps up pressure on New Delhi to cut off its energy imports from Russia. 'What he (Trump) said very clearly is that it is not acceptable for India to continue financing this war by purchasing the oil from Russia,' Stephen Miller, deputy chief of staff at the White House and one of Trump's most influential aides, said in an interview with Fox News. India is the second-largest buyer of Russian oil, after China, and more than 30 percent of its fuel is sourced from Moscow, providing revenue to the Kremlin amid Western sanctions. New Delhi imported just 1 percent of its oil from Russia before the Ukraine war started in 2022. Miller's criticism was among the strongest yet by the Trump administration – which came after the US slapped a 25 percent tariff on Indian products on Friday as a result of its purchase of military equipment and energy from Russia. The Trump administration also threatened additional penalties if India continued its purchase of arms and oil from Russia. 'People will be shocked to learn that India is basically tied with China in purchasing Russian oil. That's an astonishing fact,' Miller also said on the show. The US aide tempered his criticism by noting Trump's relationship with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, which he described as 'tremendous'. Last week, Trump also underscored the 'friendship' with India on the day he announced the tariffs on Asia's second-largest economy. While India was 'our friend', it had always bought most of its military equipment from Russia and was 'Russia's largest buyer of ENERGY, along with China, at a time when everyone wants Russia to STOP THE KILLING IN UKRAINE – ALL THINGS NOT GOOD!' Trump posted on his Truth Social platform on July 30. 'I don't care what India does with Russia. They can take their dead economies down together, for all I care.' Trump has threatened 100 percent tariffs on US imports from countries that buy Russian oil unless Moscow reaches a major peace deal with Ukraine. The US president has also criticised India for being a member of BRICS, of which Russia and China are founding members. Some analysts say the tough stance taken by the Trump administration might be aimed at pressuring Russia, while others see it as a pressure tactic to get New Delhi to agree to terms set by Washington, as the two countries are engaged in trade talks. Trump wants to reduce the US trade deficit with India, which stands at $45bn. 'Time-tested' ties Meanwhile, Indian government sources told the Reuters news agency on Saturday that New Delhi will keep buying oil from Moscow despite US threats. The Indian Ministry of External Affairs said its relationship with Russia was 'steady and time-tested' and should not be seen through the prism of a third country. New Delhi's ties to Moscow go back to the Soviet era. Russia is the leading supplier of oil and defence equipment to India. According to a March report from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), Russia remains the biggest arms supplier of equipment and systems for the Indian Armed Forces. Prime Minister Modi travelled to Moscow to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin last year, as New Delhi has tried to balance its ties between the West and Russia. He has since met Putin several times at international forums. India has historically bought most of its crude from the Middle East, but this has changed since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, as India purchased the oil at discounted rates after the West shunned Russia to punish it. New Delhi bought 68,000 barrels per day of crude oil from Russia in January 2022. By June of the same year, oil imports rose to 1.12 million barrels per day. The daily imports peaked at 2.15 million in May 2023 and have varied since. Supplies rose as high as nearly 40 percent of India's imports at one point, making Moscow the largest supplier of crude to New Delhi, the Press Trust of India reported, citing data from Kpler, a data analytics company. India says its imports from Russia was within legal norms, adding that its helped stabilise the global crude prices.
