UK News - Home Office: 40,000 immigrants missing

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Home Office: 40,000 immigrants missing

LONDON (UPI) -- The whereabouts of 40,000 people who entered Britain legally and were turned down for extended stays are unknown, the Home Office said Tuesday.

Lin Homer, head of the Border Agency, said most of the missing immigrants entered the country before 2003 and many were on student visas, the Daily Mail reported. She told members of the House of Commons Home Affairs Committee about the problem in a letter.

Officials said they had reopened files that had been in the archives and are checking names against police records and watch lists.

Sir Andrew Green, chairman of Migrationwatch UK, said the missing immigrants are "yet another skeleton in the Home Office cupboard."

"Tens of thousands of case files lying around and the true situation covered up for years on end," he added. "This is symptomatic of the utter chaos in the asylum and immigration system during the past 10 years."

Copyright 2009 by United Press International

This news arrived on: 10/21/2009

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