The people smuggler-facilitated migrant crisis in the English Channel claimed the lives of another four people Saturday, including a small child who is said to have been “trampled” to death.
According to French authorities, four illegal migrants died in two separate instances while attempting to cross the English Channel in small boats.
Jacques Billant, prefect of the Pas-de-Calais region of France, where most illegal migrants launch their attempts to reach British shores, said according to the BBC that a two-year-old child died and three other adult migrants lost their lives in another incident.
Recently installed French Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau reported that the child was “trampled to death in a boat”. He described the death as a “terrible tragedy” and said that the people smugglers “have the blood of these people on their hands”.
Mr Retailleau added: “Our government will intensify the fight against these mafias who are getting rich by organising these crossings of death.”
It comes as another 395 illegal boat migrants reached the UK on Friday. Since taking office in July, over 10,000 illegals successfully crossed the English Channel under the watch of Labour Prime Minsiter Sir Keir Starmer.
The UN’s International Organization for Migration has reported that at least 194 illegal boat migrants have lost their lives attempting to cross the English Channel between 2018 and September of this year.
Despite the mounting death toll, Paris continues to refuse to accept migrant returns from Brexit Britain as well as rejecting the idea of immediately turning boats back to its shores, arguing that it would put migrants at risk.
Instead, the French Navy continually escorts people-smuggler boats full of migrants into British territorial waters where the migrants are handed over to the UK border force or Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI), both of which have been accused of acting as “taxis” for illegal migrants.
Meanwhile, the fledgeling Labour Party government has also refused to unilaterally turn back the boats to France, with Prime Minsiter Sir Keir Starmer seeking to forge closer ties with the European Union, including potentially accepting thousands of migrants from the EU.
Starmer has pinned his hopes on disrupting the people smuggling networks operating on both sides of the Channel with law enforcement actions. However, this approach has yet to diminish the numbers crossing the busy waterway.
Commenting on the continued influx of migrants, Reform UK leader Nigel Farage wrote Saturday: “1,000 illegal migrants have crossed the Channel in the last few days. Labour have no clue about how angry their voters are going to get.”