Doctors Without Borders has denounced the British government's support for European countries such as Belarus, Greece and Hungary, and its direct participation in its anti-refugee policies.
Refugees and asylum-seekers have been seriously injured by barbed wire, which Britain helped build on the Polish-Belarusian border to keep asylum-seekers out of Europe.
At least 16 people were seriously injured while trying to cross the 5.5-metre-long fence, according to Doctors Without Borders, according to a report in the Guardian newspaper.
The organization stated that during a month, no less than 16 people, most of them from Syria, northern Iraq and Afghanistan, were treated as a result of their attempt to cross the aforementioned border fence.
On Friday evening, human rights groups called for an investigation into why the British government supported "inhumane anti-immigration measures," and asked ministers to provide an answer about "the UK's role in causing harm and misery to vulnerable groups."
For its part, the British Ministry of Defense confirmed that it had sent Royal Engineering personnel to Poland, from December 2021 to August 2022, to provide “border infrastructure support in response to the pressures of irregular migration.”
"Our medical teams have witnessed the massive injuries caused by the mistreatment of asylum-seekers and other migrants at European borders," said Sophie McCann, MSF consultant.
She expressed her grave concern over the British government's direct support for these "inhumane and anti-immigration" measures, as she described it.
McCann stated that Doctors Without Borders monitored grave violations against asylum seekers in Hungary and Greece, with indirect support from the British government as well, which amounted to assaults on immigrants, detention of children in shipping containers, and the use of tear gas to return them to where they came from.
McCann added, "We have seen the terrible cost of violent policies in dealing with asylum seekers, as Greece sends those who reach it back to the sea, and Hungary confronts them with the most violent methods, and they are two countries where the worst types of abuse occur."
And she continued: "Nevertheless, the British Home Office refuses to share minimal information about the nature of the support it provides to border guards in Greece and Hungary."
And she warned: "It is completely unacceptable that the British government continues to support this approach, while seeking to cover up evidence of its support, at every turn."
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