French officials announced on Saturday that two boats full of migrants had difficulties trying to cross the dangerous English Channel from France, resulting in the deaths of three adults and a two-year-old boy over night.

According to Jacques Billant, the prefect of France for the Pas-de-Calais area, the latest tragedies have raised the total number of migrants who have perished while trying to enter England from France this year to 51.

In one instance, migrants called for help on Saturday morning and discovered an unconscious youngster in an overcrowded watercraft.

Nearly ninety people were on board when the boat’s engine failed off the northern French coast of Boulogne-sur-Mer. The boy was beyond saving, officials declared.

The Boulogne-sur-The infant was born in Germany to a Somali mother and was crushed to death, according to Mer prosecutor Guirec Le Bras.

French officials reportedly picked up fourteen more migrants, one of which was a 17-year-old who needed to be hospitalised due to burns on his legs.

The other travellers went on their way. While French officials maintain they only get involved when a migrant is in need of rescue, they do attempt to prevent migrants from launching their boats for safety concerns.

Off the coast of Calais, in the second incident, an engine failure occurred in another overcrowded boat carrying migrants.
Following the panic, a number of people had to be rescued after falling overboard.

But according to Billant, rescuers discovered the bodies of two men and a lady, who was approximately thirty years old, at the bottom of the boat.

According to him, the three were most likely “smashed, suffocated, and drowned” in the water at the boat’s bottom.

According to prosecutors, two of the adult victims were of “African origin,” and one was Vietnamese.

Traffickers Are Cited

The French Prime Minister Michel Barnier wrote on X, formerly Twitter, “This new drama shows the need to fight relentlessly against the networks of traffickers who exploit human distress.”

Bruno Retailleau, the interior minister, likewise denounced the traffickers.

Our administration will step up its efforts to combat these groups that profit from arranging these risky crossings because the smugglers are holding these people’s blood on their hands.

In a post on X, Yvette Cooper, the interior minister for Britain, made a similar statement.

“It is horrifying that a child and other lives have been lost in the Channel today due to the ongoing organisation of these risky boat crossings by criminal smuggler gangs,” the author said.

“This is a horrible trade in lives—the gangs don’t care if people live or die.”

According to Billant, the inflatable boats that migrants used were of low quality and lacked adequate life jackets for every passenger.

He went on, saying that traffickers did not “hesitate to separate young children from their parents.”

Despite constant cautions about the dangerous route, the number of unauthorised asylum seekers entering Britain over the Channel has increased since 2018. The Channel’s frigid waters, high marine traffic, and powerful currents.