Karim (name changed) is one of the thousands of migrants in Turkey who tried to reach Greece after President Erdogan announced he would no longer stop refugees and migrants headed to Europe. During Karim's journey to the border, he claims that he and his friends were scammed and threatened. Eventually, unable to cross into Greece, he decided to return to Istanbul. He shared his story with InfoMigrants.
Four British men accused of smuggling 29 people have been jailed in the UK. The men received sentences totaling 16 years between them for their part in sailing the migrants from France to the UK.
The number of migrant and refugee arrivals in European states has gone down considerably since 2015. This however does not mean that migration attempts to Europe have gone down at the same time. A Pakistani migrant’s account of his journey sheds light on how irregular migration routes and people smuggling are still very much alive in 2020.
Border police in northwestern Italy arrested 10 people who allegedly took undocumented migrants from Italy to France at least 16 times.
Police in North Macedonia have found 53 migrants crammed inside a truck. The driver of the vehicle has been arrested on suspicion of belonging to a human trafficking gang.
Spanish police announced on February 3 they had arrested 26 suspected smugglers. The group is thought to have brought more than 900 migrants from Algeria to Spain during 2019, earning at least €1.5 million.
Authorities in France and the Netherlands have arrested 23 people suspected of involvement in large-scale people smuggling. They are believed to have smuggled 10,000 Kurdish migrants into the UK from France.
Eight migrants remain missing after trying to cross from Belgium to the United Kingdom. A total of 14 people are believed to have set out from De Panne but were forced to swim back to shore when their boat capsized. Six of the migrants, who are from Afghanistan and Iran, were taken in custody on Tuesday.
47 people were arrested in Gibraltar and Spain during the course of a police operation to break up a smuggling ring operating between Morocco, the British territory of Gibraltar and Spain.
Two Ukrainian citizens have been arrested by Italian authorities on human trafficking charges. Reggio Calabria police believe they rented a sailboat to transport migrants from Turkey to Calabria, investigative sources said.
Nine people smugglers have been sentenced to up to ten years in prison, in connection to an incident in the western Mediterranean that led to the death of a young Moroccan migrant in 2018.
A Russian man has been charged with fraud after he constructed a false border post near the Russian border with Finland. Border control authorities said he received 10,000 euros from four South Asian migrants after promising to smuggle them into the EU.