British police are holding 60 illegal immigrants after they entered Britain on a Channel Tunnel freight train.
The 59 men and one child, believed to be from Afghanistan, jumped out of the train at a freight depot near Folkestone, Kent.
Five men scaled the fences and reached the M20 motorway but were picked up by police.
A spokesman for English, Welsh & Scottish Railways (EWS) said staff had been threatened and the entry of illegal immigrants could not be allowed to continue.
"The staff at Dollands Moor are acting as unpaid border guards and they are the ones that find the asylum seekers and are threatened with knives and chisels," he said.
EWS staff detained all but five of the group and held them until British Transport Police arrived. They were then taken to Dover to be dealt with by immigration officers.
"It is clear that yet again the French government has failed to provide the much promised and necessary security required to run these freight trains, Mr Philip Mengel, EWS chief executive, said.
PA
