Near London’s historic heart, steel barricades and plywood boards block the entrance to a hotel housing some 600 asylum seekers that has recently been targeted by protests.

“I feel unsafe because the people, they really think we are (the) enemy,” an asylum seeker living in the Thistle Barbican Hotel told AFP.

The man, who is from an African country and wished to remain anonymous, has been at the hotel for around two years while his asylum claim is processed.

But “in the last two months, people have changed”, he said, describing facing increased hostility as demonstrations were held against the use of hotels to house asylum seekers.

They followed the arrest and conviction of an asylum seeker from Ethiopia living in a hotel in Epping, northeast of London, for sexually assaulting a 14-yea

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