Italy arrests about 20 people for migrant smuggling

FOSSALTA DI PIAVE, Italy (AP) — Italian and Albanian police have arrested about 20 people accused of receiving hundreds of millions of euros for bringing hundreds of refugees and migrants from Turkey to the European Union in chartered yachts and other luxury vessels, authorities said Wednesday.

Two Iraqi brothers are accused of leading a smuggling gang of people who had fled Iraq and Syria. They were arrested without incident near Venice before dawn. The Italian financial police peacefully raided a modest house and the two brothers came out handcuffed. They were both wearing sportswear.

The suspects, identified as Alaa Qasim Rahima, 38, and Omar Qasim Rahima, 30, are accused of running a smuggling ring that helped transport Syrians from Turkey through a network of partners in several countries.

They are believed to be part of a larger gang of about 80 members, alleged to have organized some thirty operations to bring at least 1,100 people from Turkey to the coast of Puglia and from there to other European countries, the agency said. Europol police.

Another ringleader, also Iraqi, is accused of helping smugglers evade detection in Italy and return to Turkey via Greece.

Payments were made through informal funds transfer systems such as hawala, which are used in countries in Africa, Asia and the Middle East by both low-wage workers and criminal gangs to move funds without leaving records.

The authorities estimate that the illicit profits from the transfer of migrants reach hundreds of millions of euros.