EU is ramping up efforts to stem the flow of irregular migrants attempting to enter the bloc from Belarus. Flight companies that connect Minsk to destinations in the Middle East could be a target of the EU's punitive measures.
A new report by Save The Children Italy revealed that in 2020, the national anti-trafficking system had 2,040 victims of trafficking in its care, 716 of whom were new cases that emerged during the year. The majority of cases are women, and Nigeria was the leading country of origin.
The Iraqi government says it will probe the smuggling of migrants after more than 1,500 mainly Iraqi nationals have crossed into Lithuania from Belarus over the past two months. Moreover, the Greek government plans to provide Lithuania with expertise and technical support.
There are growing calls for the release of five girls being held in a government-run migrant detention center in Libya. One of the girls told the Associated Press that all of them had been subjected to sexual abuse.
More than 2,000 migrants have arrived on the Italian island of Lampedusa over the past two days. Many are from Bangladesh, where myths spread about Europe lead tens of thousands of people to embark on deadly journeys.
Increasing numbers of Nigerian women are being trafficked into prostitution in Burkina Faso’s gold mining camps, an investigation has revealed. Lured by traffickers who promise them jobs, they end up with huge debts and no way out.
Police in northern Greece have arrested 13 people accused of migrant smuggling. The men reportedly abducted and tortured migrants as young as 16 years old.
A Vietnamese teenager wanted in connection with a people smuggling operation which led to the deaths of 39 migrants en route to England is to be extradited. Ngo Sy Tai allegedly ran a safe house in Belgium that held the migrants.
Seventy migrants who were reportedly beaten and tortured in six secret prisons in the Libyan city of Bani Walid have been released. The city is considered a hub of human trafficking in Libya.
More than 170 people are being treated in hospital after a deadly fire which broke out in a migrant detention center in the Yemeni capital Sanaa on Sunday, claiming at least as many as 30 lives. The cause of the fire is not known, but it is believed that the detainees were being kept in overcrowded and inhumane conditions in the facility.
The British government says it plans to crack down on people bringing migrants across the English Channel. The Prime Minister announced that penalties for smugglers would be "stiffened".
Libyan authorities have arrested the main suspect in the murder of 30 migrants last year. The migrants, mostly Bangladeshis, were killed last May in the city of Mezdah, south of Libya's capital Tripoli.