Migrants barricade London hotel after being denied private rooms
(12ft.io)https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.telegraph.co.uk%2Fnews%2F2023%2F06%2F01%2Fmigrants-asylum-seekers-london-hotel-pimlico-protest%2FMigrants are staging a pavement protest after deciding the hotel they have been transferred to was nothing like the “nice” accommodation they saw on Google Maps.
Instead of the single rooms with en suite bathrooms that they had in their Essex hotel, they found they were being forced to share – four to a single room with two bunk beds and a “smelly” toilet – in a hotel in central London.
On Thursday, the 25 migrants refused to return to their rooms in the Comfort Inn in Pimlico and instead decamped to the pavement. They say they will sleep there with their blankets, duvets, cushions and suitcases until they get single rooms.
A 27-year-old Iranian said: “Two square metres is not enough for sleeping four people. And when you go to the toilet, the smell damages you.”
A 21-year-old Channel migrant from Iran said: “They said we’re going to move you [from Park Hotel] to another, better place. They gave us this postcode. When we checked on Google Maps, we said, oh this is very nice. But when you get in, it’s like a jail. And they treat you very, very bad. They treat you like an animal.
“We didn’t come to a better life. We came to save our lives. If the Iranian government take me, they’re going to hang me because I fought for freedom. I’m Kurdish. Too many people in my family, too many people in my nationality, they’re hanged.”
“We’ll stay [on the street] until the Home Office does something for us. We can stay even for one month. It’s alright.”
A 26-year-old from east Africa who crossed the Channel on a small boat said they had been given private rooms in their hotel in Ilford. “We are not kids, everybody had a private room. We need a private room. How do you live with four men?” he said.
