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The UK government is under pressure to do more for Ukrainian refugees as the numbers fleeing the fighting steadily increases.
Boris Johnson said that the UK had been generous and will continue to be. However, UK residents trying to get family members into the UK say the situation is chaotic.
The wave of Ukrainians fleeing their country increases every day and its neighbors have responded by mobilizing resources to support them. The UN says it's already over 2 million and climbing.
The UK Home Secretary Priti Patel assured MPs that Britain would also respond.
"We have a family route for people with connections to the UK," she said. But families trying to get loved ones into the UK report confusion and complicated procedures.
At the port of Calais, the main route into Britain, there's simply a poster saying that people should go to Paris or Brussels to apply for visas. The government also said that a pop-up visa center was being set up in Lille near Calais, but reporters have been unable to find one.
Vitali Morgan lives in the UK but he's now in Calais trying to help his family clear the red tape. "We're trying to call all the possible offices and departments, "he said, "no one knows anything."
"It's pointless," says Michael Felton, whose Ukrainian mother-in-law is on her way to Britain. "It's just impossible. I don't have a route forward."
The problem seems to be that while other countries have just opened their borders, Britain still wants a formal visa process. But as Prime Minister Boris Johnson came under fire in the commons on Wednesday, he hit back, saying that the UK has always been generous and will continue to be so.
Ian Blackford, leader of the Scottish Nationalist Party, said the Home Secretary is overseeing the one "slowest, most bureaucratic and incompetent refugee responses" in the whole of Europe.
Boris Johnson pointed to the refugee background of his own family and that of the deputy prime minister, saying the government understands how much this country has to gain by welcoming refugees.
The government is expected to announce a further relaxation of border restrictions before the end of the week.
So far, the Home Office has processed just under 760 visa applications.
(CGTN)
