An investigation has been launched after a body was discovered entangled in the nets of a fishing boat in the Channel.

French authorities confirmed the body - believed to have been in the water for some time - was found by a fishing vessel off Calais yesterday.

It is not clear at this stage whether the person is someone unaccounted for when 27 asylum seekers lost their lives at sea while making the perilous journey from France to Kent last month.

Estimates at the time suggested between 34 and 50 people had been crammed onboard the flimsy inflatable dinghy when it capsized on November 24. It was later revised to 27 lives lost, including children, though exact figures are still unclear.

One of those to have perished was a 24-year-old trying to reach her fiance in the UK.

Kurdish Mariam Nouri Hamadameen was six miles into the treacherous journey when her partner, who was tracking her progress on his phone, lost contact.

There were just two survivors from what The International Organisation for Migration said had been the biggest single loss of life in the Channel since it began collecting data in 2014.

A vigil was recently held in Folkestone to mark the deaths and call on the government for safe routes of passage for those fleeing such horrors as famine, war and persecution.

French President Emmanuel Macron said at the time that Britain needed to stop politicising the issue for domestic gain and that France “will not let the Channel become a cemetery”.

The latest discovery, which has not yet been linked to the mass tragedy, was immediately reported to the Gris-Nez Regional Operational Surveillance and Rescue Center (CROSS).

The Boulogne-sur-Mer prosecutor's office has opened an investigation which was entrusted to the maritime gendarmerie of Calais.

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