On Tuesday, November 5, sentences of up to fifteen years in prison were handed down in Lille against 18 members of a large network of smugglers in the English Channel, mainly Iraqis-Kurds. The investigation established that this network largely controlled migrant crossings into England from northern France between 2020 and 2022.
In its deliberations, the court followed the prosecutor’s demands by imposing the most serious sentence, fifteen years in prison with a two-thirds security period and a preventive detention order, against a 26-year-old Iraqi, Mirkhan Rasul. Suspected of having controlled the entire network from his cell in France, he was also fined permanent expulsion from French territory and fined 200,000 euros.
Dressed in a black padded vest and sporting a dark beard, he calmly listened to the pronouncement of his sentence behind a glass case. Already convicted twice of facilitating illegal residence, he was expelled from the hearing on the third day of the trial, in October, after threatening the interpreters.
The other 17 defendants, including a woman, were sentenced to sentences ranging from one to twelve years in prison and a fine of up to 150,000 euros. All were sentenced to permanent expulsion from the territory. Arrest warrants were issued for nine of these defendants convicted in absentia.
At least 60 deaths in 2024
This trial took place between the end of September and the beginning of October, before the specialized interregional jurisdiction (JIRS) of Lille. At the beginning of her requests, the prosecutor described a “expanding file”with international ramifications.
“The accused are not volunteers who help their neighbors but merchants of death”had accused the prosecutor, describing ships loaded with passengers “up to 15 times its theoretical capacity”.
More than 50 searches led to the seizure of 1,200 life jackets, nearly 150 inflatable boats and 50 boat engines, during operations carried out jointly by France, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, coordinated by the Europol and Eurojust. .
Since 2018, the phenomenon of illegal English Channel crossings in small boats has continued to grow, with increasing numbers of migrants traveling by canoe. Shipwrecks and deadly stampedes have made 2024 the deadliest year since the beginning of this phenomenon, with at least 60 deaths to date in attempted crossings.
The defendants have ten days to appeal. In January, members of the same network had already been sentenced to sentences ranging from fifteen months to five years in prison and three others are due to be tried in Belgium next year.
