The National Police has dismantled two organisations dedicated to the illegal transfer of migrants from Ceuta to the Peninsula. The actions take place in the midst of the migratory crisis in the autonomous city, after the entry of more than 70,000 people from Morocco on 30 and 31 July, according to information provided by the Ministry of the Interior.
In a first operation, the agents arrested four people, two in Ceuta and two others in La Línea de la Concepción (Cádiz). The organisation used small boats that left from the coast of Cadiz to Ceuta to pick up people in an irregular situation and then transfer them to the Peninsula.
According to the Interior Ministry, the group had intermediaries who recruited migrants and offered them the journey in exchange for about 9,000 euros per person. To pilot the boats they also resorted to people with experience in avoiding police action, to whom they paid significant amounts of money.
The second investigation focuses on a crossing carried out on August 14, in which seven migrants were transferred from Ceuta to the peninsular coast in a small boat. The occupants were intercepted at around 4:00 a.m. on the beach of El Burgo, in La Línea de la Concepción, after spending about five hours at sea and traveling about 40 kilometers.
A witness pointed out that the organizer charged 8,000 euros per person, which would have meant an income of 56,000 euros on that journey. The seven passengers were crammed into afive-meter-long and two-meter-wide area, without life jackets or adequate means of signaling and rescue, and some of them barely knew how to swim.
The alleged perpetrator of this crossing was sent to provisional detention as investigated for a crime against the rights of foreign citizens. The Police are also investigating the possible existence of aggravating circumstances due to the vulnerability of the victims and the risk to which they were subjected during the trip. Both investigations have been carried out in coordination between different police units and the Prosecutor’s Office specialized in the fight against migrant smuggling.
