Ten migrants from the Comoro Islands, including a seven-year-old child, have drowned while trying to make their way to the island of Mayotte.
Mayotte, a French territory, is an archipelago in the Indian Ocean between Madagascar and the coast of Mozambique.
Police said their bodies were found washed up on the beach, with their boat appearing to have capsized in a strong swell.
Rescuers picked up survivors perched on coral reefs.
Mayotte has seen an influx of migrants from neighbouring poor and unstable Comoros and from countries in Sub-Saharan Africa.
About half of Mayotte’s 280,000-odd inhabitants are foreigners, about 95 percent of them from the Comoros.
