France blamed for migrant boat tragedy
Coastguards’ refusal to help before 27 lives lost may warrant criminal charges, says inquiry leak
‘You’re not listening, you won’t be saved’
FRANCE failed to tell Britain that a migrant boat was sinking and ignored a rescue offer from a passing tanker, according to a leaked inquiry.
The report also praised Britain for its exemplary response to last year’s deadly Channel tragedy.
Previous reports suggested that the French and British coastguard services each passed the buck as a dinghy packed with migrants sank in the Channel on Nov 24, killing 27 of them.
However, a note summing up the findings of an ongoing French investigation points the finger squarely at the French, suggesting Calais coastguards’ stubborn refusal to help the stricken vessel, despite migrants’ repeated and increasingly desperate pleas, may warrant criminal charges for “nonassistance of persons in danger”.
The note on the 10-month-old investigation by the Cherbourg maritime gendarme investigations unit, leaked to Le Monde, called for “further investigations” to examine this possibility.
The flimsy vessel, which was “unsuited to a night Channel crossing” set off at about 10pm local time. French authorities were first notified it was sinking at 1.35am and were made aware of its location at 2.05am.
The leaked document concludes that the French coastguard repeatedly failed to respond to distress calls sent from French territorial waters, backed up by GPS coordinates and lied to migrants by claiming it was sending a boat that never showed up.
When the migrant dinghy did finally reach UK waters, the French contacted the British but “never” told them that the boat had been in distress for hours and was sinking.
As a result, the British prioritised another three boats in distress, saving 98 migrants that night.
As soon as it was made aware of the vessel’s location at 2.30am, the UK coastguard “rapidly” dispatched its rescue boat, HMS Valiant, to the area but asked the French to send its rescue craft, Le Flamant, because it was much nearer the zone.
The French failed to do so, later claiming the boat was engaged in another rescue operation. However, Le Monde cites the probe as saying this claim was false and that Le Flamant was not, in fact, performing any “vital” task. “Receiving no more calls (from the migrants, who were in contact with the French),” the UK coastguard “clearly thought that they had been saved”, wrote the investigators.
At 3.27am, the British issued a mayday call, which went unanswered.
In further damning findings, the French also told a tanker that came across the stricken boat not to help because its rescue boat was on its way.
The following afternoon, a fishing boat came across dead bodies in the water. There were only two survivors.
In its defence, the gendarmes said that the French coastguard was clearly totally swamped by the sheer number of small boat crossings and struggling to cope. Le Monde revealed that a month before the tragedy, the highest local state representative had warned that its services were “saturated” and called for urgent “reinforcements” – to no avail.
The first confirmed victim was an Iraqi-kurdish woman who lost contact with her husband Karzan in the middle of the sea.
Baran Nouri Hamadami came from the Kurdish city of Erbil. Karzan told The Telegraph that he had followed the movements of his spouse during her journey when her GPS signal suddenly cut off. Also among the dead were seven women and a seven-year-old girl. The victims were mainly Iraqi Kurds but also four Afghans.
The gendarmes’ findings came a week after Le Monde published other extracts of the inquiry, which revealed that migrants made 15 calls to French rescuers over several hours, including from one passenger who said he was “literally in the water”.
The recordings reveal annoyedsounding French agents repeatedly instructing the distressed callers to contact the UK coastguard because they were in British waters.
“You’re not listening, you won’t be saved,” an operator is heard muttering to herself after a call with a passenger cuts off abruptly. ‘I’m in the water.’ ‘Well, I didn’t ask you to leave’.”
The French interior ministry yesterday declined to comment on an “ongoing investigation”.
But France’s Channel and North Sea maritime state prefecture said it supported the coastguard staff who do “remarkable work and continues to coordinate rescue operations”.
The number of migrants crossing the Channel has risen over the past five years to 42,000 this year.
Suella Braverman, the Home Secretary, is due to meet ministers from the Calais group of nations to plot for tackling the people-smuggling gangs.