Seven refugees nearly drown in melted chocolate while trying to smuggle into UK

A Syrian refugee has told of the terrifying moment he was trapped inside a tank of melted chocolate that nearly killed him.

In his 18th attempt to escape a down-and-out refugee camp in Calais by jumping on a lorry bound for the UK, the unnamed man was trapped into the over-heated vat of chocolate for more than two hours.

Eventually, the Syrian man and six other refugees had to break out of the lorry for fear of being drowned.

The man, who was 25 at the time, said: "We had no idea what was in the tank, but as soon as he opened it the smell hit us."

Talking to the BBC World Service, the refugee – who now lives in Sheffield – said: "It was chocolate. We were going to sneak into the UK in a heated tank of liquid chocolate."

Although it was a "really good feeling" to climb out of the freezing conditions and into the chocolate tank at first, it started to become uncomfortable after about 15 minutes, the man said.

The refugee, who eventually managed to reach the UK on a trailer loaded with new lorry cabs, had been working for an Iraqi trafficker in Calais after fleeing Syria "with nothing".

He joined four other Syrian and two Egyptian men in the tank, who were all in their mid-30s.

Although the hatch on the top of the tank was locked, the trafficker cut the wires and the refugees smuggled in while the driver was asleep.

But eventually the man, who is 6ft 1in, had to escape for fear of being killed by the melted chocolate.

"I couldn't touch the bottom of the tank," he said.

"We were all holding onto the rim of the hatch with one hand and resting the other on the next man's shoulder. If anyone had lost their grip and gone under, we'd never have been able to get to him out.

"The heat was terrible. We had to keep moving our legs to keep from getting totally trapped in the chocolate."

The desperate men stood waiting, hoping the truck would move soon.

But they stayed trapped in the chocolate for more than two hours and some of the men became so scared they began to cry.

"There was nothing to say," the refugee, who now works in an Arabic restaurant, said.

"We just cursed Bashar al-Assad for putting us in this situation.

"In the end, the others started to say that it was too hot, that we had to get out."

The chocolate was so sticky that it took all the other men to help one refugee out of the truck.

When it was time for the last man to be pushed out, he kept getting sucked back down by the chocolate because there was no-one behind him to lever him up.

Eventually he had to leave his shoes behind after they were pulled off by the chocolate.

Despite fearing for their lives in the truck, the refugee said it was good to eat all the chocolate smothered all over them on the long walk back to their tents.

"We were covered in chocolate from head to toe - our hands, our hair, our eyes - it was everywhere," he said.

"It was good chocolate, though. We were still licking at it on the way home. You could see our footprints stretching out on the road behind us."