Immigrants try cover of holiday
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• Four lorry loads of illegal immigrants were caught in the last week of 1997 as organised gangs used the Christmas holidays to try and catch the authorities napping.
• 23 December: 24 Eastern Europeans and Asians were arrested as they climbed out of a truck at Lenham trailer park in Kent.
• Christmas Eve: 23 people were picked up by immigration officials after they left a truck at an M40 service station in Warwickshire.
• 29 December: 16 men were found wedged among frozen chips in the back of a reefer at Dover.
• New Year's Eve: 16 men were arrested in Milton Keynes.
Home Office Immigration Minister Mike O'Brien says: "Many lorry drivers become unwitting dupes and are shocked to find at a late stage in their journey that their vehicle has been tampered with."
He warns drivers of hazardous loads to take special care to ensure that stowaways are not on board.