Romanians' bid for freedom ends in jail

"WE CAME for a better life," wept the small gypsy woman in the rough wool skirt and green headscarf. "We did not even know where we were going, but we were promised the life would be good."

Droma Laurenta, 39, left Tandarei in Romania on 28 November for the West. For the dream of a land of promise she squeezed into a truck bound for Britain with more than a hundred of her neighbours.

For six days the men, women and children - including nine infants - were crammed in the 40ft freight truck. Mostly they stood, as there was no room to lie down.

The journey cost all that they had. "We sold our homes to pay the man 500 Germanmarks [pounds 179] per family," said Mrs Laurenta, who came with her husband and her children aged 14, 12 and seven. She wept again. Yesterday, Mrs Laurenta and her neighbours were experiencing the good life they had been promised - huddled together in the disused wing of Joyce Green hospital in Dartford, Kent, after being taken into custody at the town's freight terminal on Thursday.

The wards are warm and dry but empty except for camp beds and a television surrounded by bewildered children. "We came to escape the Romanian police," said Nihai Victoria, 20, cradling her baby. "They were coming to our homes and beating us up. They burned our school and church and tried to take away our benefits. They hate gypsies. We just want to live in peace."

The irony, she said, was that their flight from the Romanian police took them straight into the arms of British officers.

Now they are separated from their husbands, who are being held for questioning at a detention centre. "We just want our husbands back," said Mrs Victoria. "And please don't send us back."

It is difficult to tell what sort of welcome these people expected, but it is as well they do not know that the National Front marched through Dartford on Saturday in protest at rising immigration.

The hospital had been asked to help until temporary accommodation could be foundwhile asylum applications were heard, a hospital spokesman said.

"I consider myself a Christian and it was minus four degrees outside last night," he said. "After all, these are woman and children."

Tory MP John Townend said the immigrants should not be housed in a hospital but put in an internment camp.

Howard Stoate, the Labour MP for Dartford, accused some sections of the press of whipping up anti-immigrant feeling. He said the group "were taken advantage of by traffickers in human misery".

They had sold everything to come to Britain and had lost everything. But he added that they were almost certain to be deported because they were unlikely to qualify for asylum.

An inquiry has been launched after a Chinese asylum seeker was found deadwhile under special observation at a psychiatric hospital.

Lin Yan-Guang, 35, was discovered in his room by staff at Warley Hospital in Brentwood, Essex. It was revealed yesterday that Mr Yan-Guang's family had borrowed up to pounds 20,000 to send him to Britain. He had been in Britain a year, but depressed and unemployed, he was admitted to Warley.