Germany Cracks Down on Criminal Group Helping Foreigners to Enter With Fake Documents

According to InfoMigrants, after the warrant was issued on the eve of the operation on October 20, two men and a woman were arrested, AtoZSerwisPlus.de reports.

At the same time, about 12 apartments and offices were raided in Cologne, Gelsenkirchen, and Limburg, which also belonged to the 11 suspects.

The local newspaper Kölnische Rundschau reported that the searches were conducted as a joint effort between Germany’s federal police and the Cologne public prosecutor’s office.

The 11 suspects are believed to be mostly of Syrian origin. They are also believed to have helped foreign nationals to Germany using such irregular means of migration. In this regard, they produced illegal identity cards for those who wanted to migrate to Germany.

With the falsification of these identity documents, all those who seek to enter the territory of Germany will have to show that they have the presumed right to stay in this country, allowing them to travel as well.

On the other hand, before entering Germany, immigrants would allegedly have those documents in order to be able to apply for asylum in Germany at the border.

In every smuggling operation, it is reported that the smugglers have won several thousand. At the same time, around 12,000 euros in cash during Thursday’s checks, some mobile phones, laptops, computers, and identity documents were seized.

Moreover, an employee who worked at the Foreign Office in Cologne is believed to have assisted the smugglers too. It is suspected that the employee was an essential factor in issuing foreign certificates and passports for at least three months. As a result, the 58-year-old public servant in question was also arrested.

To date, the Federal Police revealed that it had investigated nearly 26 cases related to the alleged smuggling operation. However, investigations are still ongoing, and many more cases may be discovered.

In July, a cross-border operation coordinated by Europol involving law enforcement authorities from Germany, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland, and the United Kingdom dismantled an organized crime network smuggling migrants from Belarus into the European Union.

According to Europol, a total of 11 people were arrested, ten in Poland and one in the United Kingdom, based on a German warrant. Europol also revealed that 28 locations were checked during the operation, including two in Germany, four in Lithuania, and 22 in Poland.