Rape? All most of us want is to get across to London

On the edge of a swathe of industrial wasteland in ­Calais known as The Jungle, Mohammed Aslam is bent over a water standpipe trying to shave with a makeshift mirror when the warning cry goes out: "Police!" He looks up to see two shaven-headed French police armed with truncheons bearing down on him.

Suddenly his lopsided grin is gone. He warily retreats to join the group of more than 60 young men, all illegal immigrants from Afghanistan, who have gathered at dusk before their nightly ritual: attempting to stow away aboard a truck bound for Britain.

"The police keep pestering us, asking where are the guys who raped that ­British girl on Tuesday night," says Mohammed, 22. "Yesterday police brought the girl and we had to line up while she looked at us one by one and said whether we were the ones who raped her. The police let us go because she said it wasn't any of us. It's shameful what happened, especially because they say it was Afghans who did it. But most of us, we are not here for rape. We are here for one reason — to get as soon as possible to England."

The alleged gang rape this week of a journalism student from London by migrants in Calais has thrown the spotlight on a problem many thought had gone away. But six years after the notorious Red Cross refugee camp at Sangatte was closed, it appears that a steady stream of desperate young men still fetch up on these shores with dreams of making their fortunes in England. According to French police, the woman, 31, who cannot be named for legal ­reasons, was attacked by the very men she was reporting on as part of an investigation into clandestine immigration.

Although she is being treated for physical injuries, and having counselling for mental trauma, she is still in Calais, where she hopes to identify her attackers. Police were today holding 10 men in connection with the attack described as "extremely brutal".

Philippe Muller, of the Boulogne-sur-Mer prosecutor's office near Calais, said the woman was taking photographs of immigrants outside one of their makeshift shelters at twilight on Tuesday.

"One asked her to look at something else," said Mr Muller. "She followed him inside one of the huts, and that's where it happened." While it appears that just one man actually raped the woman, ­others may face charges of aiding him or failing to help the victim. The woman, who was born in Canada but has lived in London most of her life, has admitted she was "immensely naive".

The number of refugees at Calais has dwindled to a fraction of the Sangatte days: 67,000 immigrants passed through the camp between 1999 and 2002. But more than 500 vagrants are sleeping rough in The Jungle. They are all young men, aged roughly 15 to 25. Most come from Afghanistan, Iraq, Bangladesh, Iran and Somalia. Their numbers are said to shrink to around 150 in the winter months as snow makes the mountains of Afghanistan impassable.

This is the second rape in three years in which immigrants have been implicated. The last involved a local woman. But far from demonising them, many people in Calais feel sympathy for their plight and are ashamed of their Right-wing council for refusing to provide them with permanent accommodation. "To put what happened into context, there is far more crime in other parts of Calais," a local businessman who sits on the city council tells me.

With recession looming in the UK, the question arises: why are these young men opting to journey for months on end only to wind up living like feral animals in the woods at Calais?

Mohammed Aslam, who made the journey from Kabul with his 16-year-old cousin, says: "Since my father was killed by the Taliban seven years ago, my family have been very poor. I am the youngest of five brothers and two sisters. I was a good student in school but after I left all I could earn was 2,000 Afghan rupees a day, not even enough to buy a parcel of rice. I want to be a doctor but that is impossible in Kabul. My mother said: We need doctors. You go to England and become educated then you come back and be a good doctor for our country.' "

Aslam says his mother sold a family property to pay the $10,000 demanded by the people smugglers and that they left Kabul as part of a group three months ago. "There were a dozen of us. We came by foot, bus, truck, train and boat, travelling through Iran, Turkey, Greece and Italy. Most of the time we didn't know which country we were in because we moved only at night and always hidden. Only 10 of us got here because two men died on the boat when they suffocated from being locked in a container.

"We arrived in Calais one month ago. Since then two of our group have made it to England. We wait on the side of the road and when it is dark, we climb under the tarpaulins of the trucks, but," he laughs, "we have no idea whether they're going to Belgium, England or France.

"One night we hid for six hours but the truck only went to the petrol ­station. More than 10 times I got into a truck for England but each time the French police caught me. The first time they beat me and I said: Why? I am not a thief.' Sometimes they lock you up for a few hours, but they always let us go and then we try again the next night."

But why the obsession with England? "My mother says England is the best place in the world to get educated," he insists. Does he know anything at all about the people? Does the name Gordon Brown ring a bell? "No," he says "But I know a famous English cricketer." He beams, triumphantly: "David Gower!"

In many ways Mohammed's story is typical. The young men here are desperate to improve their lives. They live with one thought: how to get to England. All express the same blind faith that London is the key to the good life. When I try to explain that they might earn 10 times more in London but that the cost of living is also 10 times more, they cannot take it in.

Yet the big surprise, given that border controls have tightened, is that they appear to be getting to England fairly quickly. Most of the young men I speak to have been in Calais only a few days. The longest anyone has been here is one month. According to the Home Office, the number of refugees caught entering Britain illegally from Calais has fallen from 10,000 a year in 2002, when Sangatte closed, to 1,500 today. So how many are entering and not being caught?

Although their comprehension of London life is notably hazy, you have to admire their ingenuity. Samir Hamdar, 15, also from Afghanistan and who has been here three weeks, leads me on a walk across a denuded industrial landscape over sand dunes and through woods to a hideout so well concealed, you can't spot it from 10 feet away.

Hidden from the air by dense foliage, and from the ground by tunnels of vegetation, he welcomes me into their one-metre-high shack made from factory pallets, poles and plastic. "Nine of us sleep here," he says. Inside are blankets, old shoes, a Holland Euro 2008 scarf and filthy clothes rolled up as pillows. It smells musty and damp but Samir says it keeps them dry in the rain.

Back in July, a section of CRS riot squad officers were ordered to clear out these shelters. They feared its reputation as a no-go area was allowing serious crimes, including drug abuse and stolen property dealing, to carry on unhindered. But fears that the immigrants would move from "The Jungle" to the nearby Tioxide chemical plant meant they held back.

"Orders to raze the camp to the ground were cancelled at short notice," a local council source told the Evening Standard. "Immigrants were putting their lives at risk by breaking into the chemical plant to create shelters. Some had been found in empty pipes usually filled with paint. The feeling was that it was safer to keep them in The Jungle for the time being."

At another point in the woods, I come across a makeshift dining room with Dunlop tyres for chairs, and a giant spindle from a nearby junk yard as a table. Mohib Shahid, 17, has lit a small fire on some bricks and is heating a tin of sardines. "Here, have one," he says. When I ask what he's had to eat all day, he says: "Just this, we learn not be hungry." He's wearing everything he owns, he says, and he's down to his last £20.

But he's not worried, he assures me, because if he needs it, the refugee charity in town, called C'Sur, provides a daily soup kitchen and a ready supply of blankets and new clothes. Besides, he grins: "I won't be here long."

Later I see Mohammed and Mohib and their friends in action. They wait until dark then walk in single file towards the car ferry terminal. The rumbling of an articulated lorry approaching is their cue. As the truck slows to negotiate the bend, the group moves silently into position. They have to time their run to perfection: the driver must not spot them, so they cannot break cover too soon but they have just a few seconds before the truck will pick up speed and leave them trailing.

Suddenly they take off, sprinting and hurling themselves towards the tailgate and lunging for the tarpaulin. For a moment it looks like they'll make it, but at the last moment the driver spots them and accelerates away. Mohammed trots back, smiling broadly.

"From here you can smell the sea but all I'm smelling is fish and chips," he laughs. What will he do if he's still here come the winter? "I will never ever go back," he says fiercely. "I have nothing to lose. My only worry is that I catch the wrong truck and end up" — he wriggles his nose in disgust — "in Belgium."

Additional reporting: Peter Allen.