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Rabat – Spain’s police have dismantled a network of five people from Morocco and Spain in Melilla for illegally smuggling migrants on a boat to the Spanish enclave.
The illegal network used a pleasure boat bearing a Spanish flag that was stolen from the marina of Melilla, according to the Spanish news outlet Europa Press.
The Spanish spokesman for the local police said during the same day that smugglers stole the boat, 18 migrants of different nationalities arrived illegally on it from Morocco to Melilla. The Moroccan head of the network was among them.
The head of the network is being held in detention pending trial.
The Spanish Civil Guard intercepted the boat and transferred the people on board to police stations for investigations.
The police spokesman explained that the investigations led to identify five members of the network; three were arrested in Melilla, one has been arrested in Morocco, while the fifth one is still wanted.
The spokesman underlined that the network is divided into two branches. He described them as “one based in Morocco, responsible for recruiting, accommodating, and transporting people to the point of embarkation on the Moroccan coast.”
The second branch in Melilla is “responsible for organizing the trip, supplying the boats and receiving the migrants once they reach the Spanish soil,” the spokesman added.
The human traffickers housed the migrants in a ranch near the city of Nador, in northern Morocco.
From the ranch, “they were transferred in vehicles on the morning of the trip, to a wooded area on the Moroccan coast, before being guided on foot to the exact point of embarkation to Melilla by a minor knowledgeable about the area,” the same source noted.
The price of the “trip” varied depending on the financial abilities of each migrant, ranging from €500 (MAD 5,323) to €4000 (MAD 42,586).
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