People smugglers are avoiding tighter security at Channel ports by opening a route through the Irish Republic to get migrants into the UK, an investigation has found.
Migrants are paying at least £10,000 for EU passports before being flown from Paris to Dublin on the promise that identity checks are laxer than at Dover, Gatwick or Heathrow.
They then travel by car to cross the 310-mile border with Northern Ireland to enter the UK before travelling on to Belfast and then by ferry to Scotland.
A people smuggler profiting from the “back door” into Britain claimed that the Irish route was “a guaranteed way to get into the UK”.
One migrant, Hamid, not his real name, paid smugglers £10,000 to make the journey via the