Federal law enforcement agencies have yet to determine if a sailboat that ran into trouble off Nova Scotia — leaving one man dead and three sailors lost at sea — was involved in human smuggling, Immigration Minister Jason Kenney said Wednesday.
But Kenney said some of those agencies believe the boat might have been trying to smuggle people into Canada based on its actions.
“We don’t have final information but it certainly was some form of irregular travel,” he said outside the House of Commons.
“We weren’t aware that these people were coming to Canada. This vessel wasn’t registered so there was something irregular going on. It certainly is a matter of concern.”
Five people were rescued from the SV Tabasco 2 about 150 kilometres south of Cape Sable Island after the yacht had a mechanical failure on Monday night.
Public Safety Minister Vic Toews said Tuesday the tragedy is being treated as a possible case of human smuggling that went wrong, and that a number of survivors from the yacht have made refugee claims.
One man who was pulled from the yacht by a Cormorant helicopter was later pronounced dead in hospital in Yarmouth, N.S., where two other men were being treated for injuries that were described by the co-pilot of the rescue chopper as cuts and broken bones.
Three other people were taken on board the passing tanker FSL Hamburg, which arrived in Saint John, N.B., on Wednesday. The military said they were taken on board the tanker because they were not injured.
The RCMP says officers with the Canada Border Services Agency have begun interviewing the two men in Yarmouth and will interview the three other sailors from the tanker in Saint John.