Turkish Police Detain 23 Alleged Smugglers Amid Trafficking Network Crackdown

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — A special unit of the Anti-Smuggling and Organized Crime Branch of Izmir police in Turkey detained 23 alleged members of a migrant smuggling network from western Turkey on Friday, as they were attempting to smuggle migrants by sea into Europe, local media reported.

According to the Daily Sabah newspaper, this operation was one of 14 which has been conducted by the police unit since October 2016 in an effort to crack down on a smuggling network based out of Turkey's Agean region. The online newspaper added that this network is believed to have made an illegal profit of some 4 million Turkish Lira ($1 million).

In total, 491 migrants have been intercepted during these operations, as well as 37 suspected smugglers from Turkey and Syria, the newspaper said. These intercepted migrants hailed from various countries currently engulfed in military conflict and humanitarian crisis, including Yemen, Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan, the Daily Sabah added.

According to Europol, more than 90 percent of migrants coming to the European Union are facilitated by members of a criminal network. The law enforcement group also noted that that migrant smuggling is an attractive and low-risk crime, which had an estimated average yearly turnover of $5-6 billion in 2015.

The highest number of "irregular migration" to the European bloc can be seen in by-sea routes through the Aegean and Mediterranean Seas. These routes are facilitated by smuggling networks from Turkey and North Africa.