A BABY in a woolly penguin hat is carried to safety after 150 migrants risked their lives trying to cross the Channel packed into three small boats.
A five-year-old girl was also among those plucked from freezing, choppy seas by Border Force officers and French officials in the early hours yesterday.
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A baby in a woolly penguin hat is carried to safety after 150 migrants risked their lives trying to cross the Channel packed into three small boats 3
A five-year-old girl was also among those plucked from freezing, choppy seas by Border Force officers and French officials
It came as the Archbishop of Canterbury praised volunteers helping refugees.
The Most Rev Justin Welby said in his Christmas sermon: “The Christmas story shows us how we must treat those who have far less than us, who have lived with the devastating limits of war and national tragedy — those who risk everything to arrive on the beaches”.
He said those working on Kent beaches close to Canterbury Cathedral are “extraordinary people”.
At least 28,020 refugees have made the dangerous crossing so far this year — more than three times the 8,500 from 2020.
Mr Welby said of RNLI crews: “I saw them the other day, just getting on with it — five times as many shouts, callouts, as they’ve ever had in the history of the Dover lifeboat. And they do one thing — save life at sea.
“And volunteers today in food banks and other places of comfort help show this country as it should be, at its best, as we dream of it to be — a beautiful sign of compassion, of generosity, of living out that saying ‘It’s not about me’.”
A source involved in the latest rescue said the migrants were believed to be Afghans, Albanians and Iraqi Kurds and added: “They were very lucky. It could have been a tragic start to Christmas Day.”
They are believed to have set off from makeshift camps in Dunkirk.
Nearly 70 were processed in Dover and the rest dealt with back in France. Meanwhile, an empty inflatable was brought ashore after its occupants were saved earlier.
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An empty dinghy is brought to shore
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