Kurdish security detain smugglers behind fatal Italian shipwreck
4 suspected human traffickers were arrested by Asayish (Kurdish Security) in the autonomous Kurdish region of Iraq on June 25th, according to Arab Weekly. The arrests come as the individuals were linked to the deadly incident off the Calabrian coast of Italy on the 19th June.
The motorboat, holding 75 people from Iran, Syria and Iraq, capsized after setting on fire following 8 days of travel from Turkey. As of the 22nd, 34 bodies have been recovered by the Italian coast guard according to the Associated Press, with 11 confirmed survivors.
READ: EU member states call to reassess Syria’s security situation
The Kurdish security forces stated that the arrested were “leaders in human trafficking” who were suspected of facilitating the “illegal travel of residents of the Kurdistan region to the Italian coast”. Asayish only revealed the initials of the suspects currently held in the province of Sulaimaniyah.
Kurdish authorities also arrested a wanted migrant smuggler under the alias of “Scorpion” earlier in mid-May.
The recent casualties off the Italian coast bring the number of either those missing or dead to over 800 people this year, according to UN agencies. The central Mediterranean migration route is seen as the deadliest in the world, responsible for around 80% of deaths in the sea.
Humanitarian groups and refugee activists blame the deaths on the failure of European migration policy.
Arab Weekly and agencies.
