Tragedy at sea claims 31 lives in deadliest day of Channel crisis

At least 31 people including five women and a young girl have died trying to cross the Channel to the UK in an inflatable dinghy, officials say, in what is the deadliest incident since the current crisis began.

Two survivors are in intensive care while police have arrested four people suspected of being linked to the drownings. The International Organisation for Migration said it was the biggest single loss of life in the Channel since it began collecting data in 2014.

He said 34 people were believed to have been on before it sank. Authorities found 31 bodies and the two survivors while one person was missing.

It is unclear what country the victims originally came from, Darmanin added.

A rescue operation is under way in the Channel by air and sea as French and British authorities search for anyone still in the water.

Refugee charities urged the government to save lives by opening safe routes for asylum seekers to apply to come to the UK without taking to the sea.

An emergency search was sparked at about 2pm when a fishing boat sounded the alarm after spotting several people at sea off the coast of France.

One fisher, Nicolas Margolle, told Reuters he had seen two small dinghies earlier on Wednesday, one with people onboard and another empty.

He said another fisher had called rescue services after seeing an empty dinghy and 15 people floating motionless nearby.

The latest deaths follow others reported but unverified in the Channel in recent weeks, amid a record number of people attempting the crossing. On 11 November, a total of 1,185 people arrived in England by boat, the most in a single day.

Until now, the largest loss of life in the Channel from a single boat came in October last year when a Kurdish-Iranian family of five died after the boat they were travelling in sank. They were Rasoul Iran-Nejad, 35, Shiva Mohammad Panahi, 35, Anita, nine, Armin, six, and 15-month-old Artin, whose body washed up on the coast of Norway months later.

A number of people are also believed to have reached Britain in small boats on Wednesday, with people seen being brought ashore in Dover by immigration officials.

It was widely expected that the number of crossings would reduce in the winter. Instead, bigger boats have been used to bring people to the UK in greater numbers.

November has been the busiest month on record with more than 6,000 having reached the UK, despite colder and rougher weather and sea conditions.

The British government has accused France of failing to control the situation. The French interior ministry says it is honouring its commitments to prevent the departures of small boats, with more than 600 police and gendarmes stationed on the north coast 24 hours a day.

France says it has increased its success rate in stopping the crossings, with 62.5% of departures being stopped in 2021, up from about 50% last year.