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On August 19, Bulgarian police arrested eight members of a ring suspected of smuggling migrants into Europe. The four suspects caught in the operation have been identified as “high-value targets” who played a leading role in the criminal activity. Europol, which coordinated the operation, announced today that the ring charged up to €6,000 per person to smuggle more than 130 people from Turkey to Bulgaria and then to other destinations in Europe via the Western Balkans route. Migrants paid up to €6,000 to be transported to Bosnia and Herzegovina and more than €4,000 to be smuggled into Serbia.
A total of 15 locations were searched in the Plovdiv region of Bulgaria, and Europol experts as well as Romanian and Moldovan police were deployed to support the Bulgarian authorities in taking measures.
Through these searches, law enforcement authorities seized 13 mobile phones, weapons and ammunition, and vehicle documents related to migrant smuggling incidents in Bulgaria.
The operation was part of a regional operational task force coordinated by Europol in Sofia, which focuses on criminal networks smuggling migrants from Turkey through Bulgaria to Western Europe.
International network dedicated to smuggling migrants
The smuggling operation appears to be a complex one involving leaders, organizers and facilitators of different nationalities.
The main leaders are Syrian and Jordanian nationals who coordinate their criminal activities with other smugglers in Turkey and along the Western Balkans route. Bulgarian citizens are responsible for logistics, namely finding and buying cars used to transport migrants and registering them in the names of others in exchange for small amounts of money. Europol said the gang would also use Moldovan drivers recruited online.
Since April this year, 17 cases of migrant smuggling have been uncovered in connection with the gang. One of the main ringleaders was already known to the police because he had been investigated in the past for migrant smuggling activities in Austria and Croatia.
From Türkiye to the Western Balkans with the help of a Moldovan driver
Illegal immigrants will cross the border between Turkey and Bulgaria on foot with the help of guides provided by Turkish organizers. After crossing the border, Moldovan drivers will be waiting for them to transport them to the Bulgarian-Serbian or Bulgarian-Romanian border.
The drivers were given cars and GPS coordinates and sent to pick up migrants at agreed locations at night. The drivers would communicate with other gang members using mobile apps with disappearing messages. Each person transported would receive 100 euros, with an average of 700 to 1,000 euros per trip.
Migrants pay about 6,000 euros to be smuggled into Bosnia and Herzegovina and more than 4,000 euros to transfer them to Serbia.
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