As part of the investigation into the death of a migrant found lifeless on a beach in Sangatte (Pas-de-Calais) on Friday after an abortive attempt to cross the Channel, a man was placed in police custody. “A 33-year-old man of Iraqi nationality was placed in police custody, both for his attitude of inciting violence against the police during their intervention and because of indications suggesting a role of smuggler,” indicated the public prosecutor of Boulogne-sur-Mer, Guirec Le Bras.
An investigation was opened for involuntary manslaughter and aiding illegal aliens in an organized gang, he said. An autopsy is planned to try to identify the causes of death of the man discovered on the beach.
62 people rescued from shipwreck
Found lifeless on Friday morning after an abortive attempt to cross the Channel, he was pronounced dead at midday. According to the story Friday by Guirec Le Bras, “a group of 70 migrants went to sea with a “small boat”, but the boat returned to the beach” around 7 a.m., for an unknown reason. Another migrant trying to reach England died during the night from Thursday to Friday off Gravelines (North) in the sinking of the inflatable boat on which he had boarded.
According to the report communicated Friday evening by the Maritime Prefecture of the Channel and the North Sea (Prémar), 62 people were rescued during this shipwreck, including the deceased migrant. “Two people are apparently missing,” she added. According to Mehdi Benbouzid, public prosecutor of Saint-Omer, responsible for this shipwreck, a man suspected of being one of the two pilots of the boat, which left from Oye-Plage, is still in police custody on Saturday.
In just 36 hours, “a thousand exiled people try to cross the Channel”
On Friday, 166 people were rescued at sea during attempted crossings and other rescue operations are taking place on Saturday, Prémar said. “For nearly 36 hours, more than a thousand exiled people have been trying to cross the Channel. At least two have died, several people have been transferred to hospital, hundreds of them are soaked and frozen. The situation is catastrophic,” wrote the exile aid association Utopia 56 on X.
The last deaths of migrants in the Channel date back to November 22, when three people died in the sinking of their boat: a man and a woman identified the same day, then a third person discovered dead on a beach in Pas-de-France. Calais, whose link with the sinking has been established, according to prosecutor Guirec Le Bras on Saturday.