A few hours after the death on Saturday of a Syrian migrant who tried to cross the Channel, a march to denounce security policy “deadly” on the Franco-British border brought together several hundred people in Calais, noted an AFP correspondent.
The death of this Syrian, early Saturday morning in Sangatte (Pas-de-Calais), is the “first death at sea in 2025” on the Franco-British border, according to the department prefecture.
This 19-year-old young man was one of around sixty passengers on a precarious boat (“small boat”), which failed to cross the Channel shortly after its departure around 4:10 a.m., reported the Boulogne-sur prosecutor. -Mer Guirec Le Bras, interviewed by AFP.
He was found on the floor of the boat when it returned to shore, “probably crushed” by other migrants in the crowd of departure, according to the prefecture.
A man born in Syria, aged 33, was “arrested and placed in police custody as having been able to organize the departure”added Mr. Le Bras.
“This new tragedy highlights the terrible dangers of small boat crossings, and we continue to do everything we can to prevent them”reacted a spokesperson for the British government on Saturday.
London once again pointed the finger at the smugglers, “these criminals” Who “only care about profit, not the lives they endanger”.
“Unworthy situation”
But the 500 to 600 participants in a march “for justice and dignity” which took place on Saturday afternoon in Calais, at the initiative of numerous migrant aid associations, unions and political representatives of the left and far left, heard it differently.
“Our seas are being transformed into cemeteries, and it is an outrageous situation which is not in accordance with the values of the European Union but also with the values of France” declared to AFP Majdouline Sbaï, EELV MEP present in the procession.
France “has created laws of inhospitality which aim to make our territory hostile, and which by further securing the borders, precipitate people towards death”she estimated.
THE “repressive policies” at the Franco-British border are forcing migrants to take ever greater risks to attempt the crossing, according to their supporters.
In the peaceful demonstration, a group of exiles carried a black coffin covered with flowers, and other demonstrators carried a large banner displaying the names of migrants who died during their dangerous journey to England in recent years.
According to a latest report from the Pas-de-Calais prefecture, 77 migrants died in 2024 while trying to reach England aboard « small boats ». A record since the use of this means of crossing in the Strait of Pas-de-Calais began in 2018.
Last year, 36,816 candidates for exile managed to reach England on small boats, or 25% more than in 2023, according to the British Interior Ministry.
This increase increases the pressure on Keir Starmer’s Labor government, while the reduction in immigration, both legal and illegal, was one of the major issues of the electoral campaign that brought him to power in July, which also seen the breakthrough of Nigel Farage’s anti-immigration Reform UK party.
According to Downing Street, Channel crossings by « small boats » was one of the topics raised by Keir Starmer and the French president, Emmanuel Macron, during their meeting on Thursday evening at Checkers, the country residence of the British prime ministers.
