SANGATTE, France: French officials said Wednesday the body of a young man from Yemen had been found on a beach in northern France from where many migrants seek to cross the channel in small boats to England.
The body was not far from the water on the sandy beach in Sangatte outside the northern port of Calais, surrounded by about 10 police officers, an AFP photographer saw.
“It is a young man aged around 20 of Yemeni nationality,” the regional prefecture told AFP.
Bodies have been found washed up repeatedly on the beaches around Calais in recent months. The small boats used by migrants to cross the Channel often capsize or suffer from chaotic embarkations during which some passengers are left in the water.
After a record year for deaths in the Channel, clandestine crossings have continued in the middle of winter, despite sometimes freezing temperatures.
Fifty-nine migrants aboard a boat in difficulty were rescued Tuesday at sea in French waters, local officials said.
At least 77 migrants died in 2024 while trying to reach England on board small boats, a record since the start of this type of crossing in 2018.
On January 11, a 19-year-old Syrian died during an attempted crossing, “probably crushed” by other migrants during departure, according to the authorities.
Both London and Paris have vowed to crack down on the people smugglers who are paid sometimes thousands of euros by migrants to organize the crossing to England.
But the issue has also repeatedly caused tensions between the French and British governments. Paris has claimed that London’s lax enforcement of employment rules attracts migrants.
There have been high-profile arrests of people smugglers, but activists say the traffickers are now trying to pack more people into the small boats, making the crossings even more dangerous.