an association denounces the refoulement of a migrant boat, the maritime prefecture rejects

An action she judges “illegal and dangerous”. The Utopia 56 association denounced, Tuesday, May 31 in a press release, the “repression” unprecedented towards the French coasts of a boat of migrants who left for England on May 6th. According to the association, which cites other pushbacks in the Mediterranean, “this is the first time that such a case of forced refoulement has been identified in the Channel”. A version challenged by the maritime prefecture, which ensures that it was a rescue. According to the press release issued the same day by the latter, the star boat Eulimène of the nautical brigade of the national gendarmerie of Calais had been engaged after having identified a boat in difficulty. The star had recovered “on board 19 castaways”then deposited on the beach of Sangatte.

But according to the testimonies collected by Utopia, the boat “presented no technical problem, when, around 6.20 a.m., two gendarmerie boats surrounded it and circled it four or five times, causing waves which had the effect of filling the boat with water of about twenty centimeters”, leading to panic among migrants. According to the association again, “it was never offered” to passengers “to get on a police boat and their boat was towed to the beach”. “All those interviewed agree that no emergency call was made from the boat and that the method of intervention contributed to their endangerment”points Utopia.

“The prefecture lied and pretended it was a rescue”denounced the general delegate of Utopia, Yann Manzi. “There are no refoulement instructions, we are sticking to our rescue mission, our course of action has not changed one iota”, then reacted the maritime prefecture. Its spokesperson, Véronique Magnin, however, admitted that the press release of May 6 contained an error, the migrants having in fact been towed.