The transport racket behind the migrant smuggling racket

Border guards flagged down a white Ford Transit van some 4 kilometers extracurricular of Komotini successful northeastern Greece successful January. A young Greek antheral drove while 11 migrants from Afghanistan and Iraq were squashed into the back. Among them were two underage boys who had crossed the Evros borderline with Turkey conscionable a fewer hours earlier. The officers logged successful the van’s plates and recovered it was registered with a αυτοκίνητο rental institution successful Athens.

Leased cars are the go-to λύση for the transgression networks that smuggle undocumented migrants from Greece’s northeastern onshore borderline farther into the country. They recovered that stealing cars to bash the occupation was too risky, so the gangs present prosecute radical to rent the vehicles they request and others to thrust them. The erstwhile airs arsenic tourists astatine the rental companies and tin seldom beryllium traced; neither tin the drivers, who are besides temporary hires. The vehicles are astir often recovered abandoned adjacent the Evros River oregon successful the upland passes of Rodopi, occasionally banged up. The losses suffered by the rental companies – and particularly the smaller ones – are rather significant.

To drawback a thief

Zoe Stergiouda, a typical for Evros Car, an Alexandroupoli-based steadfast that has been astir for 30 years, has seen the occupation turn first-hand. “There are definite hazard signals,” she says. “Like when someone is carrying astir a batch of currency oregon claims they don’t person a batch of money, oregon shares too galore details without being asked, which whitethorn bespeak that they’re lying astir why they want the vehicle.”

Stergiouda says that vehicles leased from her steadfast and recovered to person been used by migrant smugglers had been rented by some Greeks and foreigners, and adjacent by a woman with a kid successful 1 case.

In August 2023, firefighters battling a monolithic blaze successful southern Evros came crossed an abandoned light-blue Renault that had been leased from Evros Car successful Alexandroupoli. They managed to salvage it intact. A fewer days later, the radical astatine the steadfast discovered a video connected TikTok featuring the very aforesaid car. The 18-second video was seemingly an advertisement for the smuggling network, with Arabic subtitles and footage of migrants climbing into the interior, adjacent into the trunk. Another video posted to the aforesaid relationship – which had 5,870 followers and a Turkish telephone fig attached to the illustration photograph – showed a achromatic BMW speeding on a wood roadworthy successful Evros.

When the authorities negociate to intercept these vehicles and apprehension their drivers, they complaint them with quality trafficking. The wrongful enactment involving the car’s rental, however, has been committed by the idiosyncratic who signed the lease. The complaint there is vehicle misappropriation, which tin lone beryllium pursued if the αυτοκίνητο rental companies record a ceremonial complaint. This is the lone way to get their vehicles back.

“It used to necessitate a judicial bid for the vehicles to beryllium returned to the companies. It was a process that could take months,” says Komotini lawyer Angelos Nestoridis, who specializes successful transgression law. “Now they are returned by bid of a magistrate, often earlier the probe into the smuggling has been wrapped up.”

‘The larger companies managed to trim their vehicle losses to a minimum, chiefly by making outgo by recognition paper mandatory and by utilizing special ID scanners’

The transgression organizations down the rackets did not fto the accidental presented by the authorities spell unexploited. One cognition adjacent opened a αυτοκίνητο prosecute institution successful Thessaloniki connected the reasoning that adjacent if their drivers – who are treated arsenic expendable – are arrested, the vehicles will still beryllium returned to their firm. The racket was unopen down by the constabulary a fewer months later.

“The occupation of vehicle misappropriations goes hand-in-hand with the density of migration flows,” Nikos Passias, a subordinate of the committee of the Association of Car Rental Companies and concern unit manager of αυτοκίνητο rentals astatine Kinsen Hellas – Europcar and Goldcar, tells Kathimerini. “The occupation intensified aft the pandemic, specifically during the 2022-2023 period, but the larger companies managed to trim their vehicle losses to a minimum, chiefly by making outgo by recognition paper mandatory – enabling a speedy recognition cheque – and by utilizing special ID scanners that supply individuality verification services,” says Passias.

Even when the rented vehicles are not damaged, the smugglers occasionally vandalize them – possibly they want to destruct evidence, oregon possibly they’re conscionable getting their kicks. Either way, the vehicles are not regarded arsenic stolen, so security sum for immoderate damages is very costly, arsenic would beryllium the installation of a tracking system connected a company’s full fleet of cars.

The accomplices who rent the cars for the transgression enterprises are seldom caught and brought to justice. In 1 lawsuit where this did happen, the suspect was a Greek nationalist who claimed helium rented the αυτοκίνητο connected behalf of a friend. That person was ne'er found, of course.

The terms list

According to constabulary reports, the traffickers complaint an mean of €2,000 per idiosyncratic to transport them from the Evros borderline to the bluish larboard of Thessaloniki, Greece’s 2nd largest city. The radical recruited lone to rent the vehicles get paid €200 oregon less, while the drivers get astir treble that. In its astir caller study connected organized crime, from 2024, the Hellenic Police said that the smuggling teams working the Egnatia Odos road successful northeastern Greece are not the aforesaid arsenic the ones that get the migrants crossed the Greek-Turkish border. It adds that isolated from rentals, the rackets transporting migrants from the borderline into the hinterland besides use vehicles registered successful adjacent countries similar Bulgaria, Moldova and Serbia, arsenic well arsenic stolen vehicles.

According to authoritative documents seen by Kathimerini related to caller arrests made successful the past fewer months successful the Evros portion for migrant smuggling, the bulk of the drivers that person been caught are Romanian, Ukrainian and Moldovan nationals.

In January, a Moldovan nationalist was arrested adjacent the village of Megalo Derio successful Evros when helium was caught transporting 10 undocumented immigrants, while successful precocious April, the authorities arrested a Romanian nationalist adjacent Nea Santa successful Rodopi for transporting different six migrants. In some cases, the vehicles they were driving were registered to nutrient companies extracurricular Greece.

In November 2025, the police’s spot crimes unit, which is portion of the organized transgression division, coordinated a large-scale cognition to place stolen vehicles nationwide – with the assistance of the Association of Insurance Companies – but besides astatine engaged borderline crossings similar Mertzani, Krystallopigi and Kakavia. Codenamed JAD Mobile 8, the cognition was portion of a larger European inaugural coordinated by Frontex and including the information of Germany, Spain and Poland. The 10-day cognition identified 694 stolen vehicles, of which 231 were located successful Greece. Moreover, 84 radical were arrested for not having due travel documents and 21 connected charges of migrant smuggling.