At least 12 dead in Channel crossing attempt, French officials say – DNyuz

At least 12 people, including six minors, have died after a rickety, overcrowded boat suddenly capsized off the coast of northern France on Tuesday while attempting to cross the Channel, French authorities said.

It was the deadliest incident on the waterway this year as the French and British governments struggle to prevent migrants attempting the perilous crossing.

Crammed by smugglers onto a boat less than 25 feet long, more than 60 people fell into the water after their “extremely fragile” vessel began to sink, according to Gérald Darmanin, France’s interior minister. Almost none of them had life jackets, he said.

“This is a tragedy that affects us all,” Mr Darmanin told reporters at a news conference in Boulogne-sur-Mer, a town in the Pas-de-Calais coastal region where the ship sank and which in some places is less than 30 miles from the British coastline.

The ship sank about three miles off the coast, French authorities said. Twelve people were hospitalized, two in critical condition, they added.

Jacques Billant, prefect of Pas-de-Calais, told reporters the boat broke up “quickly and brutally” shortly after 11am as it headed towards Britain.

Guirec Le Bras, the prosecutor in Boulogne-sur-Mer, told reporters it was not immediately clear what caused the boat to sink or how the victims died. But he said his office had opened an investigation into a range of possible criminal charges, including involuntary manslaughter. Investigators had not yet determined the exact nationalities and ages of the people on board, he said, but most appeared to be from Eritrea and it appeared that most of the victims were women or children.

French maritime authorities said in a statement that rescue operations involving helicopters, fishing boats and French navy ships were quickly underway and that rescuers pulled 65 people from the water.

One of the worst migrant accidents in the Channel occurred in 2021, when 27 people died after their boat capsized. But deadly tragedies on a smaller scale have occurred before.

Darmanin said many of the latest incidents took place near Boulogne-sur-Mer, an area that has become more attractive to smuggling networks after French authorities stepped up patrols and security further north along the coastline.

Nearly 36,000 people attempting to reach Britain were targeted by search and rescue operations in the Channel in 2023, up from more than 51,000 in 2022, according to a report by French maritime authorities.

But the average number of people per boat has grown from 30 to 50, making a dangerous crossing even more dangerous, the report said. Last year, 12 people died trying to cross in the French search and rescue zone, the report said.

The Channel is one of the world’s busiest shipping routes. The waters are freezing cold, especially in winter, the winds can be treacherous and migrants attempting to cross often crowd into rickety inflatable boats.

Both France and Britain accuse people smugglers of endangering the lives of migrants.

“The gangs behind this appalling and callous trade in human lives are cramming ever more people into ever more unsafe rowing boats and sending them out into the Channel even in the worst weather,” Yvette Cooper, the British Home Secretary, whose office oversees immigration into the country, said Tuesday. “They care about nothing but the profit they make.”

British and French authorities agreed last year that Britain would pay France £541 million, currently more than $700 million, over three years to help pay for drones, a new detention centre and hundreds of extra police officers to patrol beaches in northern France – one of several deals the two countries have struck in recent years to try to reduce the number of border crossings.

But the Channel crossings have become a recurring sore point in relations between the two countries, and Mr Darmanin said on Tuesday that only a new “migration treaty” to harmonise asylum and deportation rules between Britain and the European Union would provide a lasting solution.

Less than 5 percent of migrants from Africa or the Middle East staying in makeshift camps on the coast ultimately apply for asylum in France, he said.

Many people would rather cross the Channel than stay in France. They see Britain as an attractive destination with a strong labour market where English is spoken. They may also have family living there or know people from their home country.

“Nothing can stop the desire to stay with your family, find a job and live properly,” Mr. Darmanin said.

At least 19,294 people have arrived in England via the Channel in small boats since the start of 2024, according to UK government data. That is similar to the number of arrivals in the first eight months of the previous year.

The arrival of the small boats across the Channel has become a major point of political tension in Britain after the former Conservative government vowed to stop the boats and introduced a controversial plan to send asylum seekers to Rwanda in a bid to deter migrants from attempting the crossing.

Britain’s Labour government, led by Prime Minister Keir Starmer, announced after a landslide victory in July that it would scrap those plans. Since then, however, the issue of immigration has taken centre stage, with far-right riots tearing through cities across Britain this summer.

Although the number of boat people has risen significantly since 2018, they represent a fraction of total immigration to Britain. Most people making the crossing are asylum seekers fleeing war and persecution.

According to the University of Oxford’s Migration Observatory, around 93 percent of people who arrived in small boats between 2018 and March 2024 applied for asylum. Of those who received a decision by March 31, around three-quarters were successful.

Enver Solomon, the chief executive of the Refugee Council, a British charity that supports asylum seekers and refugees, said in a statement on Tuesday that “the number of deaths in the Channel this year has been shockingly high.”

But “enforcement alone is not the answer,” Mr Solomon said. “Increased security and policing measures on the French coast have led to increasingly dangerous crossings, with vessels operating from more dangerous locations and in unstable, overcrowded vessels.”

He added that the British government must take action against the criminal gangs often responsible for smuggling people across the Channel, but must also “develop a plan to improve and expand safe routes for those seeking safety.”

The story At least 12 dead in Channel crossing attempt, French officials say first appeared on the New York Times.