<div><span style="font-size: 1rem;"><b>Four migrants died overnight and a fifth was in critical condition today after trying to reach Britain from northern France despite freezing temperatures, the French maritime authority said.</b></span><br></div><div><br></div><div>The group was attempting to reach a vessel off Wimereux when their small boat got into difficulty around 2am local time, the maritime prefecture told AFP.</div><div><br></div><div>“We have four dead migrants and one migrant in a critical condition at the hospital in Boulogne-sur-mer,” said one official.</div><div><br></div><div>A tugboat patrolling the coast went to the rescue and found the bodies, the first reported migrant deaths on the Channel in 2024.</div><div><br></div><div>The region around Calais, the jumping-off point for the shortest crossing to England, has long been a magnet for migrants.</div><div><br></div><div>More than two decades after the closure of a Red Cross centre in Sangatte, hundreds of people still live in tents and makeshift shelters near Calais and Dunkirk, hoping for a chance to make the crossing hidden in a truck or aboard a small boat.</div><div><br></div><div>The boats are a political priority for the British government and a bone of contention with France, as tens of thousands of people a year have been making the dangerous crossing.</div><div><br></div><div>According to the British government nearly 30,000 migrants crossed the Channel from mainland Europe to Britain in small boats in 2023, an annual drop of more than a third.</div><div><br></div><div>In November 2021, at least 27 people drowned when their dinghy capsized. - AFP</div><div><br></div><div>bnbd24/fas</div>