Sudanese man arrested in U.K. after 4 die trying to cross Channel

A group of Kurdish migrants failed their attempt to reach the United Kingdom by boat after being discovered by the police refuse to return to shore on the beach of Ambleteuse, northern France (AP Photo/Bernat Armangue, File).

U.K. police on Friday said they had arrested a Sudanese man a day after four migrants died attempting to board a small boat off the coast of northern France.

The National Crime Agency (NCA) said the 27-year-old man was detained on Friday morning at a migrant processing centre in southeastern Kent on suspicion of endangering life.

The two men and two women who died were swept away by the current as they tried to board the boat with dozens of other people.

The northern French coast is the main point of departure for migrants hoping to reach Britain, usually risking the journey in flimsy, overcrowded boats.

The fatalities bring the number of small boat deaths this year to six.

The suspect was detained on suspicion of “endangering another during a journey by sea to the U.K.”, the NCA said in a statement.

He was being held in police custody and being interviewed by NCA officers, who are also speaking to those who made the journey, it said.

Some 74 migrants went on to make the Channel crossing on Friday although 38 were returned to the French shore, it added.

NCA deputy director Craig Turner said the agency would work with “colleagues at home and abroad” to do “all we can to identify and bring to justice those responsible for these four tragic deaths”.

‘Taxi boats’

The migrants were trying to board a so-called “taxi boat”, officials said on Thursday -- dinghies move out to pick up dozens of migrants who wade into shallow waters.

This method is used to try and avoid security forces on the coast from stopping the boats from launching.

Two men, one Sudanese and the other Afghan, died last week trying to make a similar crossing -- the first reported deaths in the Channel this year.

Last year, at least 29 people died, according to an AFP tally based on official French and British sources.

The handling of undocumented migrants has been a political point of contention between Paris and London. The U.K. government is under pressure from the anti-immigration hard right to curb arrivals.

France changed its approach at the end of last year to allow the interception of taxi boats at sea, although only under certain conditions.

A French regional official has said police did not intervene to stop the boat on Thursday.

Nearly 50,000 people on 795 boats attempted to make the crossing last year, according to French official figures.

British authorities recorded 41,472 small-boat arrivals in 2025, the second-highest total after a record 45,774 in 2022.