The EU has been warned that a new ‘Calais Jungle’ could spring up on its headquarters’ doorstep.

Belgium’s deputy prime minister Jan Jambon said an unofficial migrant camp in Brussels was inevitable unless authorities took action.

It is feared the city has become a new hub for people-smuggling gangs hoping to find a backdoor into Britain.

Speaking to a parliamentary committee last week, Mr Jambon said: ‘If we want to avoid a new Calais Jungle, continuous monitoring has to be carried out.’

The warning came after the minister gave the green light to a police crackdown to tackle an apparent increase in UK-bound migrants arriving in Brussels. The approach prompted a furious response from charities and activists, who accused the senior politician of fear-mongering.

Belgium’s deputy prime minister Jan Jambon said an unofficial 'Calais Jungle' style migrant camp in Brussels was inevitable unless authorities took action (Pictured: Calais Jungle after being cleared in 2016)

More than 2,000 took to the streets of Brussels on Sunday to protest Mr Jambon’s ‘inhumane’ order to arrest more migrants. Mr Jambon, who is also Belgium’s interior minister, said a tough response was needed after an increase in the number of migrants in an area of Brussels that previously hosted a Jungle-style camp.

His officials counted about 600 migrants as food was handed out last week at a meeting point just two miles from the EU’s buildings in the city. Mr Jambon, who belongs to the Flemish N-VA party, said this marked an increase from 500 on New Year’s Day, 250 in mid-December and 100 in November.

The area, which lies beside Brussels North railway station and an immigration office, became a makeshift home for 1,000 at the height of the migration crisis in 2015. The camp was closed later that year.

Charities yesterday disputed Mr Jambon’s figures and said there were no signs a new camp would emerge. Mehdi Kassou of the Brussels Citizen Refugee Support Platform, which assists asylum seekers, said: ‘This [suggestion of a Calais-style camp] is communication based on fear. Mr Jambon wants to make people feel afraid.’

The Jungle camp in Calais, which has been a magnet for those hoping to reach the UK for years, was home to 10,000 at its peak before being destroyed in October 2016.

The warning came after the minister gave the green light to a police crackdown to tackle an apparent increase in UK-bound migrants arriving in Brussels, prompting protests (Pictured: A boy holding up a sign which reads 'we are all the same')

Mr Kassou disputed Mr Jambon’s claims about the numbers of migrants in Brussels, with a peak of 523 registered by the charity last week, down from 720 last August.

He admitted that those arriving in the city often used it as a point of ‘transit’, with the UK seen as the ‘default’ destination for most. The group’s records show most of those coming to Brussels were men, with about 45 per cent from Sudan, 20 per cent from Eritrea and another 20 per cent from Ethiopia. A further 10 per cent were from Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan.

Police began the hard-line approach on Sunday evening, arresting 17 suspected illegal immigrants without valid documents at Brussels train stations.

Officials said the stations were targeted because they lead to a busy motorway that connects Brussels to the ports of Calais and Zeebrugge – both major smuggling points into Britain.

A spokesman for the interior minister said yesterday: ‘We want to map out how the smugglers work.

‘We suspect that Brussels is an important hub for transporting migrants to [the motorway] from where they continue their journey.’

Last week Belgian police said smuggling gangs were driving migrants to use increasingly violent tactics to board vehicles destined for Britain. On Friday, officers were forced to fire a warning shot after coming under attack from a group of 40 migrants armed with wooden poles at a lorry park near Brussels.

Police had spotted five migrants trying to board lorries before two officers were struck in the melee.