Friday 10th December 2021
After capsizing a migrant boat
French fishermen find dead body in the net
In the English Channel, fishermen make a gruesome discovery: there is a corpse in the net of their cutter. A migrant boat overturned there more than two weeks ago, leaving at least 27 dead. Now it is determined whether the finding of the dead person is related to the sinking.
More than two weeks after a boat carrying migrants capsized in the English Channel with at least 27 dead, fishermen found a body in the net of their cutter off Calais. After a briefing with the water police, the fishing boat returned to the port of Calais on Friday, the Maritime Prefecture announced in the evening. The gendarmerie took care of the dead.
The public prosecutor in Boulogne-sur-Mer has started an investigation. The investigation has yet to reveal whether the dead person was found in connection with the sinking of the boat.
The inflatable boat had lost air during the illegal crossing from northern France to Great Britain on November 24 and the migrants had fallen into the water. A fishing boat discovered the dead floating in the middle of the English Channel. Among them were five women and a little girl.
Two survivors made serious allegations against the British and French authorities. From their sinking boat, they would have alerted the French coast guard and the British police. Both had referred to the other side and no one helped.
The refugee crisis near Calais has been going on for years. Since the boat capsized, France and Great Britain have again been struggling to cope with the increasing number of migrants arriving in Great Britain via the English Channel. A solution is not yet in sight.
On the contrary, after the recent disaster, the fronts hardened. France canceled a meeting with Great Britain on migration across the English Channel at the end of November – shortly after British Prime Minister Boris Johnson used Twitter to call for an agreement with France to take back migrants.