A mother from a stateless Arab minority say she and her family have no choice but to try to cross the Channel again despite the death last month of her eldest daughter on a previous attempt.
Dina Al Shammari, 21, was travelling with her parents and three teenage siblings when she was crushed to death in an overcrowded dinghy off the coast of Calais on 28 July.
Her mother, Amira Al Shammari, 52, said the family arrived in France at the start of last month and had attempted the crossing five times before the night her daughter died.
The family who are Bidoon, a stateless Arab minority, previously fled Kuwait in 2018. Asked whether the family would try again to get to the UK, Al Shammari said: “We have no options here, where should we go? Who’s going to give us the protection? We have to do that again.”
She said the family had been told there would be 60 people on board the inflatable boat. But on the day of the crossing they discovered the numbers were “double” that.
Speaking to the PA news agency from Calais through an interpreter, Al Shammari said: “The boat was so crowded. Dina was the first one, she ran to the boat because she wanted to go to the UK as soon as possible.”
She added: “Then they followed her and, just like squeezing her from all over the place. When squeezing her, she wasn’t able to breathe and she started shouting.”
Al Shammari said the boat was at sea for about an hour before the French coastguard reached them. She said some on the boat had threatened the family and the driver with a knife to keep going rather than call for help. When the coastguard reached the dinghy her daughter was no longer breathing, Al Shammari said.
According to the French maritime prefecture, 34 people were rescued from the “heavily loaded” boat at about 5.30am, while others on the boat refused help and continued the journey to the UK.
An investigation into the death is continuing in France. In the UK, the National Crime Agency arrested and bailed a 29-year-old Egyptian man on suspicion of facilitating illegal immigration, in connection with the crossing.
Al Shammari’s family are waiting for Dima’s body to be released by the authorities as funds are being raised to help pay for her burial by the French organisation Groupe Décès.
So far this year, 17 people have died in the Channel, according to confirmed reports by the French coastguard from rescue operations.