New talks over Sangatte camp

Immigrants at the Sangatte holding camp in northern France

PARIS, France -- Britain and France are holding a second round of high-level government talks to try to resolve the dispute over the Sangatte refugee camp.

UK Home Secretary David Blunkett has said he is "hopeful" of progress towards a deal when he meets his French counterpart, Nicolas Sarkozy, on Friday.

Britain wants the controversial Sangatte camp, run by the Red Cross near Calais and the entrance of the French side of the Channel Tunnel, closed.

The camp, which houses around 1,200 Afghans and Kurds, is allegedly used by thousands of illegal immigrants as a staging post to Britain.

Speaking ahead of the talks in Paris, Blunkett said negotiations on closing the Sangatte camp, near Calais, were "difficult."

He told BBC radio: "I want to make progress on Sangatte. I don't expect to wave a piece of paper... in Paris this afternoon and say it's going to close by October.

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"What I expect to get is an absolute guarantee that steps being taken by us both will result in a reasonable target for closing Sangatte."

Asked what he would consider a "reasonable target," Blunkett refused to be specific, saying: "We'll have to negotiate on that ... it's a difficult task."

Blunkett and Sarkozy have previously failed to agree a timetable to close the Sangatte centre but did set out a joint-funded plan to tighten security on the French side of the Channel.

After the first-round of talks, last month, Sarkozy said the Sangatte problem had "poisoned" relationships between France and the UK for more than three years."

Blunkett wants to allow freight rail services through the tunnel, which have been severely disrupted by refugees trying to stow away on board trains, to resume full operations.

Freight company English, Welsh and Scottish Railways Ltd (EWS), said last month it was having to cancel as many as 60 percent of services because of the problem.

Blunkett is holding talks with his French counterpart

"We've got to turn this around, and by September 1 (EWS) has got to be able to run full services. That is one of the tasks that I have today," Blunkett said.

The Sangatte camp is on land owned by Channel Tunnel operator Eurotunnel and was requisitioned in 1999 to house up to 200 people. But the numbers held there have been as high as 1,800.

Eurotunnel says it intercepted about 18,500 refugees trying to enter the tunnel in the first half of 2001 alone.

Last year, six people died trying to sneak through the tunnel, and more than 100 were injured, the French Interior Ministry said.