Posted:
22.10.2024 12:18:00
Media: gang transporting illegals from Middle East busted in Italy
Italian Finance Guard discovered a crime group of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq nationals who transported illegal immigrants from the Middle East to Italy and further to France. In their phone conversations they called their clients ‘sheep’, or ‘pigeons’, RIA Novosti reports.
“Investigators were able to collect major evidence about a Türkiye and Iraq based crime gang with chapters in Italy, France, and Greece. They transported illegal immigrants by sea, mainly from the Middle East, but also from other Asian countries like Iraq, Iran, Kurdistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Syria, and Lebanon, to the Calabrian coast where they wanted to go,” Corriere della Sera and the law enforcement press release both state.
13 people living in various Italian provinces were apprehended during the recent police raid. They provided accommodations, along with bus and train tickets to the French border to those who wished to go further north. From there, middlemen guides were taking illegals to France.
The newspaper claims a trip like that from Türkiye to Europe cost every client 7–10 thousand Euros. In their phone calls intercepted by the police migrant smugglers disparaged their clients calling them ‘sheep’, or ‘pigeons’.
Welcoming the Finance Guard operation, the Italian PM Giorgia Meloni pointed out that her government’s absolute priority is ‘to fight against those who exploit people’s valid desires to find a better place to live in order to enrich themselves’.
“Our government is committed to destroying those crime networks and weed out human trafficking that serves the interests of the third millennium slave traders,” she said.
