Channel drownings: UK and France trade
accusations after tragedy at sea
Boris Johnson renews calls for France to agree to
joint patrols along its coast, while Emmanuel Macron urges UK not to politicise
the flow of migrants
Boris
Johnson speaks after dozens of people died trying to cross the Channel.
Virginia
Harrison, Rajeev Syal, Angelique Chrisafis, Diane Taylor and agencies
Thu 25 Nov
2021 05.10 GMT
British and
French leaders have traded accusations after at least 27 people died trying to
cross the Channel in the deadliest incident since the current migration crisis
began.
In a phone
call with Boris Johnson on Wednesday night, French president Emmanuel Macron
stressed “the shared responsibility” of France and the UK, and told Johnson he
expected full cooperation and that the situation would not be used “for
political purposes”, the Élysée said.
Thirty-four
people were believed to be on the boat when it sank on Wednesday, leading to
what the International Organisation for Migration said was the biggest single
loss of life in the Channel since it began collecting data in 2014. Two
survivors are in intensive care.
The British
prime minister renewed calls for France to agree to joint police patrols along
the Channel coast, and said Wednesday’s incident highlighted how efforts by
French authorities to patrol their beaches “haven’t been enough”.
“We’ve had
difficulties persuading some of our partners, particularly the French, to do
things in a way that we think the situation deserves,” he said on Wednesday. “I
understand the difficulties that all countries face, but what we want now is to
do more together – and that’s the offer we are making.”
The French
have previously resisted UK offers to send police and Border Force agents to
mount joint patrols amid concerns about the implications for national
sovereignty.
Macron also
called for an emergency meeting of European government ministers and an
immediate funding boost for the EU’s border agency, Frontex. France’s
government is holding an emergency meeting on Thursday morning to discuss next
steps.
“France
will not let the Channel become a cemetery,” Macron said.
The French
interior minister, Gérald Darmanin, called for coordination with the UK, saying
“the response must also come from Great Britain”.
The House
of Commons is set to hold a debate on “the numbers of migrants arriving in the
United Kingdom illegally by boat” just before midday on Thursday, according to
a recently released parliamentary schedule.
Speaking on
Newsnight, immigration compliance minister Tom Pursglove confirmed Johnson had
renewed a previous offer for UK police and Border Force officers to take part
in joint patrols with the French, and said the last incident showed the two
countries needed to deepen their cooperation.
“The prime
minister and President Macron have had exactly that discussion this evening.
That is something that I am very keen to see happen,” he said. “It is the case
that in the past we have offered to host and to help with joint patrols. I
think that could be invaluable in helping to address this issue. I really do
hope that the French will reconsider that offer.”
A
spokesperson for Johnson said the two leaders had agreed to the urgency of
stepping up joint efforts to prevent the deadly crossings. They also
highlighted the importance of working closely with Belgium and the Netherlands,
as well as other countries across the continent.
The mayor
of Calais, Natacha Bouchart, said it was the British who were to blame and
called on Johnson to “face up to his responsibilities”. “The British government
is to blame. I believe that Boris Johnson has, for the past year-and-a-half,
cynically chosen to blame France,” she said, according to French media reports.
The Channel
is one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes and currents are strong. Human
traffickers typically overload the dinghies, leaving them barely afloat and at
the mercy of waves as they try to reach British shores.
Both
countries cooperate to stem migration across the Channel but also accuse each
other of not doing enough – and the issue is often used by politicians on both
sides pushing an anti-migration agenda.
Darmanin
told a news conference in Calais those who died in Wednesday’s tragedy included
five women and a girl. He said the boat that sank had been “very frail”, and
compared it to “a pool you blow up in your garden”.
He said 34
people were believed to have been on before it sank and it was not clear what
country the victims originally came from.
Four
suspected traffickers have been arrested, two of whom later appeared in court,
he said.
Refugee
charities called on the government to save lives by opening safe routes for
asylum seekers to apply to come to the UK without taking to the sea.
Enver
Solomon, the chief executive of the Refugee Council, said: “How many tragedies
like this must we see before the government fundamentally changes its approach
by committing to an ambitious expansion of safe routes for those men, women and
children in desperate need of protection?
“Every day,
people are forced to flee their homes through no fault of their own. Now is the
time to end the cruel and ineffective tactic of seeking to punish or push away
those who try and find safety in our country.”
An
emergency search was sparked at about 2pm on Wednesday when a fishing boat
sounded the alarm after spotting several people at sea off the coast of France.
The latest
deaths follow others reported but unverified in the Channel in recent weeks,
amid a record number of people attempting the crossing. On 11 November, a total
of 1,185 people arrived in England by boat, the most in a single day.
More than
25,700 people have made the dangerous journey to the UK in small boats this
year – three times the total for the whole of 2020, according to official
figures.
It was
widely expected that the number of crossings would reduce in the winter.
Instead, bigger boats have been used to bring people to the UK in greater
numbers.
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