The misery of the Third World washed up on the richest beaches of the First World and the dangerous rocks of French politics at the weekend.
More than 900 Iraqi Kurdish refugees were stranded in a rusty freighter in French waters between Cannes and St Tropez.
The 910 refugees, imprisoned in the ship's hold for eight days with little food or water and no toilets, had paid traffickers $4,200 for each adult and $1,700 per child to make the overland journey from northern Iraq to the coast of Turkey and on to western Europe.
They had bribed Turkish border guards and boarded the Cambodian-registered East Sea; but the hold was so crowded that the immigrants were not able to lie down to sleep.
It was dark, and many lost track of time and days. One baby was born during the ordeal. The Red Cross said most of the passengers were suffering from dehydration, and 16 needed hospital treatment.
The Turkish-speaking crew, who reportedly wore masks, appeared to have deliberately steered the East Sea into a sandbar before dawn on Saturday and then abandoned ship. French authorities have issued a warrant for their arrest.
Mr Daniel Chaz, deputy director of the French border police, said the refugees were victims of a joint operation by Turkish and Iraqi mafia gangs.
About 100 men swam ashore after the ship was grounded, building a bonfire on the beach. One knocked on a door saying: "Help. UN."
Doctors and aid workers, food and medical supplies, were dropped on to the ship by helicopter. After the refugees were taken ashore, the vessel was towed out into the Mediterranean, where it sank in 1000m of water.
It is the first time that such a large number of immigrants have arrived in France in so dramatic a fashion. Italy is usually the landing point for ever-increasing numbers of Balkan, Middle Eastern, Asian and African immigrants.
Mr Ahmet Alim, a member of a Kurdish opposition group, suggested that Turkish officials had co-operated in dumping the refugees in France in retaliation for the French parliament's recent recognition of the 1915 Turkish genocide against the Armenians.
Turkish officials showed little inclination to help in the investigation, claiming they had no record of the East Sea docking in a Turkish port.
Immigration had receded as a political issue in France since a split in Mr Jean-Marie Le Pen's racist, xenophobic National Front weakened the anti-immigrant party; but with municipal elections less than a month away, the East Sea shipwreck is likely to revive the question.
The ruling socialists, however, seem to feel that a lenient approach to the Kurds might work against them at the poll.
Mr Francois Hollande, the leader of the Socialist Party, said France would "welcome with humanity" but could not "give them the illusion or hope of integration into our country".
Ms Elisabeth Guigou, the Minister for Social Affairs, met some of the Kurdish immigrants in Frejus. She stressed that although they could apply for asylum, those failing to meet legal criteria would be repatriated.
That was what Mr Bruno Megret, the leader of the National Movement, a breakaway party from the National Front, demanded. Mr Charles Pasqua, another right-wing politician and former interior minister, stressed that the Kurds were economic, not political, refugees.
But the Kurds come from northern Iraq, which suffers from UN sanctions, oppression by President Saddam Hussein and cross-border military raids by Turkey in pursuit of Kurdish separatists. If anyone had a case for political asylum by virtue of persecution, it could be argued that it is the Kurds.
London will also be watching closely the case of the East Sea. Most of those aboard were hoping to join relatives already living in Britain. One thousand Kurds and Afghans are living in a camp in Calais, waiting for a chance to cross the Channel.
At a summit on February 8th Paris agreed to allow British immigration officials to check Eurostar passengers at the Gare du Nord. Traffickers often coached and dressed up would-be immigrants to Britain as tourists because it was relatively easy to avoid scrutiny on the cross-Channel train.
