24/04/2026

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PARIS: Britain and France have agreed to a new three-year deal to stop undocumented migrants making the risky journey across the English Channel, according to a French Interior Ministry roadmap seen by AFP on Wednesday. France has 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 will provide up to €766 million (RM3.56 billion) in funding, although nearly a quarter of that will have strings attached and be paid only if the French measures work. The cross-Channel neighbours have been wrangling for months over the renewal of the Sandhurst treaty, which sets out the United Kingdom’s financial contribution to French efforts to stop migrants attempting the perilous sea crossing to Britain. The United Kingdom has long accused France of doing too little to prevent would-be asylum seekers, a hot-button issue in British politics, from setting off from French shores, with smugglers and migrants taking ever-greater risks to avoid detection. As a result, London insisted that 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

UK, France strike deal to address migrant crossings

to expand its fleet. China’s shipbuilding industry now dwarfs the United States, which was once a global powerhouse. Trump’s US$1.5 trillion (RM5.95 trillion) defence budget request for fiscal year 2027 includes over US$65 billion to procure 18 warships and 16 support ships made by General Dynamics and Huntington Ingalls Industries. It is part of what the Pentagon is calling the “Golden Fleet” initiative, which officials say is the largest shipbuilding request since 1962. – Reuters Patrick Morrisey confirmed that the state’s Emergency Management Division, Health Department and Environmental Protection Department have been activated and are coordinating with county authorities. “Our top priority is the wellbeing of our citizens. We are working around the clock with local officials to ensure this incident is contained and all necessary state resources are on the ground to protect the community.” – Bernama-Xinhua Authorities did not immediately release further details on the identities of the victims or the conditions of those hospitalised. Ames Goldsmith Corporation president Frank Barber issued a statement acknowledging that two employees had died. “Ames Goldsmith Corp is deeply saddened by the deaths of two of our colleagues,“ he said, adding that the company is cooperating fully with local, state and federal agencies to determine the cause of the incident. West Virginia Governor law of the sea, once a boat has set off from shore, authorities can only intervene to save people from drowning. According to official figures from British authorities, 41,472 people reached the United Kingdom irregularly in small boats in 2025, the second-highest figure since large-scale crossings were first detected in 2018. At least 29 migrants died at sea in the Channel in 2025, according to an AFP tally based on official French and British sources. The French side has pointed to the fact that since the beginning of the year, arrivals to the United Kingdom have halved compared with the same period last year. About 480 smugglers were also arrested in 2025, according to the French Interior Ministry. – AFP

Senator Jack Reed, the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, called Phelan’s dismissal “troubling”. “I am concerned it is yet another example of the instability and dysfunction that have come to define the Defence Department under Trump and Hegseth.“ The latest departure comes during a tense ceasefire with Iran, as the United States deploys more naval assets into the Middle East. The US military is relying on naval assets to carry out a blockade of Iran. The navy is under intense pressure The incident was reported at 9.31am local time at Catalyst Refiners, a silver recovery facility located in the community of Institute, about 16km northwest of the state capital city Charleston. Preliminary investigations indicate that the plant was shutting down operations, with workers engaged in cleaning and decontamination activities in preparation for closure, according to a press release by the Kanawha County Commission. It is believed that a chemical reaction occurred during that process, triggered by the unintentional mixing of two chemical agents, producing hydrogen sulfide, a toxic, colourless gas with an odour of rotten eggs, it said. The reaction caused “a violent reaction of the chemicals and it instantaneously overreacted“, said its emergency management director C.W. Sigman at a briefing. Among those hospitalised were seven ambulance workers who were survival relies on his Labour party defying predictions of a chastening set of defeats in May’s local elections, caught between a surging Green party to the left and anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage’s Reform UK to the right. Apart from the step-up in law enforcement on the beaches, France is looking to deploy drones, helicopters and digital resources to “better prevent attempted crossings” and reduce the number of departures, particularly of “taxi boats”, the roadmap said. “A large share of the resources planned under this partnership will be concentrated from the start of the summer and throughout the summer period”, traditionally the peak period for small boat crossings, the document said. By the terms of the international

core contribution of €580 million still represents a €40 million hike on what it paid under the last treaty. French Interior Minister Laurent Nunez and his UK counterpart Shabana Mahmood were set to lay out further details of the plan yesterday while on a visit to a building site of an accommodation centre for people set to be deported from France. The deal’s renewal comes at a vital time for UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who faces pressure from the right to curb immigration. On top of that, the centre-left leader is engulfed in an unrelenting scandal over the appointment of Peter Mandelson as ambassador to the United States despite his friendship with the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Many believe Starmer’s political

o Paris to increase law enforcement on coast to 1,400 officers by 2029, London to provide €766 million in funding British taxpayers’ money is used by the French government. According to the French ministry roadmap, if the new measures do not deliver “sufficient results, based on a joint annual assessment, the funding will be redirected to new actions”. But even if the conditional portion is not paid, the United Kingdom’s

Two dead in chemical leak at factory NEW YORK: At least two people were killed and 19 others sent to hospital on Wednesday after a chemical leak at a silver catalyst manufacturing plant in the US state of West Virginia, local authorities said, reported Xinhua. responding to the leak, officials said. In the chaotic aftermath, victims were transported to local hospitals in private cars and even a garbage truck, added Sigman.

PEACEFUL PROTEST ... Police officers detaining a climate activist during an Earth Day Uprising rally outside Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue in New York City. – REUTERSPIC

Pentagon sacks navy secretary WASHINGTON: Navy secretary

secretary to be fired since Trump came back into office last year. His departure fits within a broader context of upheaval at all levels of leadership at the Pentagon, including the firing last year of Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Air Force General C.Q. Brown, as well as the chief of naval operations and Air Force vice-chief of staff. On April 2, Hegseth fired Army Chief of Staff Randy George without citing a reason. Two US officials said the decision was tied to tensions between Hegseth and Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll.

was dismissed in part because he was moving too slow to implement reforms to speed shipbuilding and also because he had fallen out with key Pentagon leadership. One source cited bad relationships with Hegseth, Hegseth’s deputy Steve Feinberg and the navy’s No. 2 civilian Hung Cao, who the Pentagon said will take over as acting navy secretary. The source also cited an ethics investigation into Phelan’s office. A billionaire seen as being close to President Donald Trump, Phelan is the first administration-picked service

John Phelan has been fired, a US official and a person familiar with the matter said on Wednesday, in another wartime shakeup at the Pentagon coming just weeks after Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth ousted the army’s top general. The Pentagon announced Phelan’s departure in a brief statement, saying he was leaving the administration “effective immediately”, but it did not provide a reason or say whether it was his decision to go. The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Phelan