4 dead as immigrant boat sinks
2008-11-21 16:04
Mamoudzou - Four people died and 17 are missing after a boat carrying migrants sank as it was heading towards the French Indian Ocean island of Mayotte, local authorities said on Friday.
Four bodies and 12 survivors have been recovered since the seven-metre speed boat got into trouble while crossing a coral reef, leaving 17 more of those who began the journey from the Comoros missing, officials said.
Mayotte is French territory and its stronger economy attracts many migrants from the nearby Comoros, an independent island chain, despite the dangers of braving ocean waters in fishing boats known locally as "kwassa-kwassa".
"The whole island is in a lagoon, surrounded by a reef with relatively narrow gaps," Mayotte spokesperson Odile Guarrigues said, adding that the site of the accident was made more dangerous by currents around an undersea shelf.
A fisherman came upon the ship-wrecked travellers late on Thursday night near the coral barrier south of Mayotte, and managed to rescue eight of them before sounding the alarm, according to the local French government office.
Three police launches headed to the area and managed to recover four more survivors, and as the day dawned rescue aircraft were scrambled to the scene. The 12 rescued migrants, including a child, were taken to hospital.
Mayotte lies only 70km from the main island of the Comoros, Anjouan, and opposition politicians claim that illegal immigrants now make up around a third of the French island's population.
Already this year, French police have intercepted 200 "kwassa-kwassa" - wooden-hulled boats with outboard motors named after a Congolese dance because of the way they twitch in heavy seas - making the perilous journey.
Arrested immigrants are usually sent home within five days, but many simply try again. Mayotte's per capita gross domestic product is nine times that of the Comoros, making it an irresistible destination for fortune-seekers.
Guarrigues said that no decision had yet been taken on the fate of the survivors of the latest tragedy, except that measures were being taken to help them identify the dead.
On July 24, in a previous accident, six people died and 16 more went missing.