Four Indian nationals are dead after trying to illegally cross the US border into Canada near Emerson, Manitoba. Canadian authorities said bodies of four Indian nationals, including a baby and a teen, were found in Canada near the United States border. The Manitoba Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) on Thursday said that the bodies of four people — two adults, a teen and an infant, belonging to one family — were found on the Canadian side of the border near Emerson on Wednesday, with the authorities believing it to be a failed crossing attempt during a freezing blizzard.

OTTAWA – Four Indian nationals are dead after trying to illegally cross the US border into Canada near Emerson, Manitoba.

Canadian authorities said bodies of four Indian nationals, including a baby and a teen, were found in Canada near the United States border.

The Manitoba Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) on Thursday said that the bodies of four people — two adults, a teen and an infant, belonging to one family — were found on the Canadian side of the border near Emerson on Wednesday, with the authorities believing it to be a failed crossing attempt during a freezing blizzard.

"Shocked by the report that 4 Indian nationals, including an infant, have lost their lives at the Canada-US border. Have asked our Ambassadors in the US and Canada to urgently respond to the situation," India's external affairs minister Dr S Jaishankar tweeted on Friday evening.

Terming it "a grave tragedy", Ajay Bisaria, high commissioner of India to Canada, said an Indian consular team is travelling from Toronto to Manitoba, where the bodies were found, to coordinate and help in the investigation. "We will work with Canadian authorities to investigate these disturbing events," tweeted Bisaria.

In the US, the attorney's office for the district of Minnesota said that a Florida man, identified as Steve Shand, 47, was charged Thursday with human smuggling after seven Indian nationals were found in the US and the discovery of the bodies.

According to court documents filed Wednesday in support of Shand's arrest, one of the Indians spent a significant amount of money to come to Canada with a fraudulent student visa.

"The investigation into the death of the four individuals in Canada is ongoing along with an investigation into a larger human smuggling operation of which Shand is suspected of being a part," John Stanley, a special agent with Homeland Security Investigations, said in court documents.

According to the documents, a US border patrol (USBP) in North Dakota stopped a 15-passenger van just south of the Canadian border on Wednesday. Shand was driving and court documents allege he was with two Indian nationals.

The court documents said that law enforcement discovered cases of plastic cups, bottled water, bottled juice and snacks located in the extreme rear of the passenger van.

Law enforcement also discovered receipts dated January 18, 2022, for the drinks and snacks, and rental agreement receipts in Shand's name for the van, with the return date listed for January 20, 2022.

As they were taking the trio back to the border patrol station in North Dakota, officers came across another group of five Indian nationals walking.

They said they had walked across the border and expected to be picked up by someone.

The group said they estimated they had been walking for more than 11 hours, and they appeared to be headed to an unstaffed gas plant located in St Vincent, Minnesota.

In the group, a woman stopped breathing several times as she was transported to hospital. Court documents said she will require partial amputation of her hand. A man was also hospitalised for frostbite but was later released.

One of the men in the group was carrying a backpack that had baby supplies in it. Court documents said he told officers it belonged to a family who had become separated from the group overnight.

RCMP assistant commissioner Jane MacLatchy told a news conference in Winnipeg Thursday that once Mounties were notified the family may still be in Manitoba, officers immediately began to search the area.

After a difficult search in nearly impassible terrain, she said officers found three bodies together - a man, a woman and a baby - just 10 m (33 feet) from the border near Emerson, Manitoba. The search continued and a teen boy was found a short distance away. It is believed they died from exposure.

"It is an absolute and heartbreaking tragedy," MacLatchy said.

They were wearing winter clothing, she said, but it would not have been enough to save them, with the freezing conditions.

"These victims faced not only the cold weather but also endless fields, large snowdrifts and complete darkness," MacLatchy added.

According to court documents, the USBP received a report from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police that four bodies were found frozen just inside the Canadian side of the international border.

Shand was arrested Wednesday and remains in custody. Shand is charged with one count of knowing or in reckless disregard of the fact that a foreign national had come to, entered, or remained in the United States in violation of law, having transported, and moved or having attempted to transport such nationals.

He made his first appearance before the US District Court Magistrate Judge Hildy Bowbeer on Friday.

Shand was ordered to remain in custody pending a preliminary inquiry and detention hearing, currently scheduled for January 24.

American authorities allege in court documents that Shand has likely been involved in other border crossings, including two recent incidents in December.

Officials in both countries said it is more common to see crossings north from the US into Canada. Border crossings into Canada on foot increased in 2016 following the election of former US President Donald Trump.

That December, two men lost their fingers to severe frostbite after getting caught in a blizzard while walking from the US into Manitoba. A few months later, a woman died of hypothermia near the border on the American side.

Deputy Patrick Klegstad with the Kittson county sheriff's office in Minnesota said his department is supporting the American side of the investigation. Its officers patrol the "desolate" open fields near the border every day, he said, and the area where people crossed is treacherous, especially in the cold.

"Why they picked that spot to travel would be the million-dollar question."

Klegstad, echoing Canadian officials, said it's uncommon to have people make the harrowing journey from Canada into the US.

"It's not very often we do have southbounders."

Earlier this week, a major winter storm blanketed a swath of North America in snow stretching up the east coast from Georgia to Canada, disrupting travel and cutting power to thousands of homes.