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French court tries 9 Afghans over Channel people smuggling

Nine Afghans have gone on trial in France accused of attempting to smuggle migrants across the Channel to Britain in 2021.

French court tries 9 Afghans over Channel people smuggling
Nine people are in court in France on people smuggling charges. (Photo by Sameer Al-DOUMY / AFP)

The case is the latest as Britain and France seek to clamp down on small boat crossings into the United Kingdom on a perilous route that has become increasingly used since 2018.

The men, whose trial opened in Paris on Tuesday, are accused of having helped 53 mainly Vietnamese and Afghan migrants set off on the dangerous sea crossing on dinghies on four occasions between January and March 2021.

Four were being tried for a leading role in the smuggling operations, while another five were accused of having played a secondary role.

They have been charged with organised support for illegal immigration.

Several of the defendants were suspected of having bought dinghies as well as life jackets and then depositing them in sand dunes near the seaside town of Wimereux, according to the charge sheet.

One of the defendants, who did not appear in court, told investigators about a dinghy launch he witnessed.

A passenger designated as the boat’s captain did not have to pay for his passage, while a second, tasked with navigating the vessel using GPS, only
paid half price, according to his statement read out during the hearing.

All the rest paid between €1,500 and €4,000 each, the charge sheet showed.

In all four cases, the passengers were rescued either in French or British waters.

According to the British government, more than 45,000 migrants arrived on the shores of southeast England on small boats in 2022.

The previous year, more than 28,000 people were detected arriving.

In November 2021, at least 27 people drowned when their dinghy deflated during the journey. They were mostly Kurds from Iraq and included a child aged seven.

The investigation into that case is still ongoing.

In December 2019, a French court jailed two smugglers – an Afghan and a Dutchman of Guinean origin – for six and three years for manslaughter and aiding illegal migration after a 31-year-old Iranian woman drowned during a crossing.

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CRIME

French cinema boss on trial for sexual assault

The head of France's top cinema institution Dominique Boutonnat denied sexually assaulting his godson as he went on trial Friday in a case that has led to calls for him to step down.

French cinema boss on trial for sexual assault

The trial comes as French cinema reels from a renewed #MeToo reckoning that has seen several big names, including acting legend Gerard Depardieu, accused of sexual abuse.

READ ALSO: French actor Gérard Depardieu to be tried for sexual assault in October

Activists have denounced Boutonnat’s continued leadership of the National Centre of Cinema (CNC), whose role includes overseeing measures to curb sexual violence in the industry.

His godson accuses him of trying to masturbate him during a holiday in Greece in 2020 when he was 19.

“I looked at him to find my godfather and that’s when I saw someone completely different… It was someone using me to masturbate,” the godson, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told the court.

Boutonnat responded in court that it was his godson who had initiated the situation and kissed him.

“I feel bad about leaving an ambiguous situation, but to say there was a sexual assault is false,” he told the court.

He was placed under investigation in February 2021 but still reappointed by the government as head of the CNC in July 2022.

Training to prevent abuse has in recent months become obligatory for films seeking public funding via the CNC.

The CNC told AFP that the case against Boutonnat came from “the private sphere” and had no relation to its activities.

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