The family of a seven-year-old Iraqi girl who drowned while trying to reach Britain on a small boat have blamed ‘people smugglers with no morals’ for the disaster.
Rula died on Sunday after falling into the River Aa, at Watten, some 20 miles inland from Calais, in northern France.
She was with her parents and four other adults who hoped to get 10 children aged between seven and 13 to the English Channel, and then across to the UK to claim asylum.
But the stolen boat collapsed within minutes, flinging everybody into the cold water, around an hour before sunrise.
Following Rula’s funeral this week, her pregnant mother Nour told Sky News: ‘She was beautiful and I lost her.
The family of a seven-year-old Iraqi girl – Rula (pictured) – who drowned while trying to reach Britain on a small boat have blamed ‘people smugglers with no morals’ for the disaster
‘My little princess. She was seven years old, she had seen nothing in this world. We just wanted to make their lives better.’
The family had paid the equivalent of £5000 for the trip across the Channel alone, having travelled overland from Iraq, where their lives were threatened.
But the boat provided for the last leg of the journey was falling apart, and had no life jackets onboard.
‘The people smugglers have no morals,’ said Rula’s father, Mohammed, who said the boat was an overcrowded death trap.
‘Every day, I think of dying a hundred times,’ he said. ‘The water came into the cabin and she was stuck. The smugglers had left us.
‘I had to rescue my wife, my son and another person. But I couldn’t rescue her.’
Mohammed continued: ‘My daughter died and the reason why is because of the people smugglers who have no morals.
‘They fooled us, took money from us and threw us in the water without any mercy. They do not see humans as humans – they only see materials and money.’
Survivors included Rula’s brothers, Muhaimen, 14, Hassan, 10, and Moamel, eight.
‘She was very dear to us, but what do we do?’ said Hassan, adding: ‘I want her to come back but she won’t.’
Despite the trauma, the family is now preparing to try another small boat trip to England, said Mohammed. This will mean leaving Rula’s final resting place in northern France, where she is now buried.
Migrants are seen being brought ashore by UK border force in Dover on March 3
Pictured: An inflatable dinghy carrying around 65 migrants is seen crossing the English Channel on March 6, 2024
Migrants gather on a beach after they failed to illegally cross the English Channel to reach Britain, in Sangatte, northern France, on December 15, 2023
Charlotte Huet, the Dunkirk Prosecutor, said Rula died ‘as a result of cardiorespiratory arrest’.
At least three alleged people smugglers were taken into custody following her death.
The prosecutor said a criminal enquiry had been opened for ‘manslaughter, unintentionally causing injuries, criminal conspiracy and aiding illegal immigration within an organised gang, while endangering others.’
The 16 people on board the stricken boat had been hoping to avoid police patrols, so as to enter the English Channel close to the Belgium border.
‘It is a route that has been used by people smugglers before,’ said an investigating source. ‘On this occasion, the boat was overloaded and too flimsy to support those onboard, who included women and children.
‘There was chaos in the water after the boat collapsed, and it led to a seven-year-old girl losing her life.’
The Aa river originates at the village of Bourthes and empties into the sea near Gravelines, close to Dunkirk.
It follows three migrants going missing in thick fog and heavy winds in the Channel last Wednesday after their UK-bound small boat capsized.
One was confirmed dead after his body was recovered, while two others are also thought to have drowned at sea.
Despite the poor conditions, people smugglers took advantage of a small break in even more severe weather to push out multiple migrant boats from French shores.
The latest fatality also follows five migrants dying while trying to get to Britain on January 14.
The latest crossings take the provisional total number of arrivals in 2024 so far to 2,006
Some 29,000 people reached the UK in small boats in 2023, despite the British government saying that stopping them was a priority.
It is trying to push ahead with a plan to send some asylum seekers to Rwanda, despite the London Supreme Court ruling that the policy is unlawful.
In August last year, six people died after a boat carrying migrants sank in the Channel off the French coast.
And in November 2021, at least 27 migrants died after a dinghy sank while heading to the UK – the highest recorded number of deaths from a single incident.