A student from Norwich who drowned at a beach in France entered the water despite not knowing how to swim, an inquest has heard.

Jialian Yu, of Hall Road, drowned while visiting a beach in the south of France with coursemates in May this year.

Mr Yu, a 28-year-old masters student at the University of Leicester, was on an overseas placement in Toulouse when he and a group of friends decided to take a day trip to Port la Nouvelle, on the Mediterranean coast.

An inquest into his death resumed in Norwich on Monday and heard that he and a number of others opted to take a dip in the water - despite Mr Yu being unable to swim.

Statements from three of his friends were read out to the court describing how onlookers had scrambled to pull him out of the water and an ambulance crew fought for more than an hour to save him.

However, Mr Yu, who was born in Guangdong in China, died at the scene before his body was airlifted away.

In one of the statements, one friend, Nihar Modi, said he urged Mr Yu not to enter deep waters but did not see how he got into trouble.

Mr Modi said: "Seven of us decided to go in the water. Since Jialian did not know how to swim, I asked him to stay in shallow waters while I went to swim in the depths.

"After a while, I turned back and saw him drowning in the water."

Another friend, José Alonso, described seeing another of the group frantically waving and shouting for help and called for an ambulance.

He said that paramedics fought "for more than an hour" to try and bring Mr Yu around, but were unable to.

He said: "I did my best to be as helpful as possible. I do not know the details of what happened during this time [when Mr Yu was in the water]."

However, following the three statements being read, Mr Yu's father requested further witness statements be sought.

Senior coroner Jacqueline Lake adjourned the inquest to allow this to happen.