Wednesday November 24th 2021
Crisis meeting in London
31 migrants die in the English Channel
Since the beginning of the year, the authorities have registered more than 30,000 attempts to flee to Great Britain via the English Channel. When a refugee boat capsizes, people are killed again. Politicians in Paris and London are appalled.
31 people died in the sinking of a boat carrying migrants en route to the UK. Among them were five women and a little girl, as France’s Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin announced in Calais. Two other people who were on the boat were rescued. Four smugglers who may have been involved in the failed crossing from France were arrested. Prime Minister Jean Castex spoke of a “tragedy”. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, in whose country the refugees wanted, called an emergency meeting.
French President Emmanuel Macron called for a crisis meeting at European level. France will not allow the English Channel to be turned into a cemetery and smugglers put human lives in danger. The funds of the border protection agency Frontex at the external borders of the EU should be increased immediately.
The crew of a French Navy boat saw people floating in the water off the coast of Calais that afternoon. The interior ministry said that the navy took several castaways on board, some of them unconscious. Three helicopters and three boats were involved in the rescue operation.
The public prosecutor’s office in Dunkerque began investigations into “particularly serious manslaughter”. “The English Channel is gradually becoming a cemetery, like the Mediterranean,” said Pierre Roques of the aid organization L’Auberge des Migrants.
Tugs receive 6,000 euros per person
A few days ago it became known that the police had taken 15 suspected human smugglers from Iraq, Romania, Pakistan and Vietnam into custody. They are said to have brought about 250 migrants to the UK in boats every month. For the crossing they would have received 6000 euros per person and made a total of three million euros in profit.
According to the responsible prefecture, there have been 31,500 attempts by refugees to cross the English Channel from France to Great Britain since the beginning of the year. About 7,800 people were rescued from distress at sea. In total, at least 34 people have died or are missing in 2021. According to British figures, around 22,000 migrants have come to Great Britain across the English Channel since the beginning of the year.
There are many migrants in the Calais area. Aid organizations criticize that security forces regularly evacuate their camps and destroy tents and sleeping bags in the process. The migrants are offered emergency accommodation in other parts of the country. However, many of them keep trying to get into the UK.
Migrant crossings to the UK add significantly to tension between Paris and London. Many migrants want to go to Great Britain because they speak the language and already have friends or relatives there. The increase in the numbers since August is likely to have something to do with the fact that the crossing will soon be even more dangerous with the falling temperatures.