ROME: Italian police have dismantled an organization in the country’s northeast that worked to illegally smuggle hundreds of migrants from Kurdish areas into Europe in exchange for large sums of money.
Five people were arrested in the city of Trieste, near the border with Croatia and Slovenia. Two Iraqi Kurds were also put under house arrest.
Operation Hub began a year ago in several Italian cities and was extended abroad, said Massimo De Bortoli, an anti-mafia prosecutor in Trieste.
Italian police said the organization aided and abetted illegal immigration to Europe, especially Germany and France. Most of the migrants were Kurds from Syria and Iraq.
Italy to charge NGO workers with aiding illegal immigration from LibyaItaly sees rise in migrant arrivals