Europol Probes High-Speed ’Death Boats’ Used in Migrant Smuggling from Morocco

These new fast boats are capable of transporting a large number of migrants, their quality is described as "high" and they can cover long distances in a short time. The Spanish security services in addition to the European police Europol and Frontex, the European Border and Coast Guard Agency, claim to already be on the case to discover their origin.

According to the first results of the investigation, these death boats are manufactured in Spain and then transported to the Moroccan coasts, in order to be used to smuggle illegal immigrants into Europe. They would have only one distributor, based in Spain, reveals Alyaoum24.

In Morocco, several workshops for the manufacture of high-performance inflatable boats have just been raided by the Moroccan security services, in several regions. Boats used by the mafias to smuggle illegal immigrants from the city of Salé are manufactured there. Thus, a clandestine workshop was discovered in Salé, and another, to name but a few, in the vicinity of Taourirt. Everything needed to manufacture inflatable boats, including raw materials, was found there.

According to Frontex, 6,700 illegal immigrants would have arrived in Europe in January and the majority, namely 3,700, would have landed in Spain. Most of them are from Morocco, Ghana and Mali.