UK police arrest man and woman for human trafficking over truck deaths – World

Police investigating the deaths of 39 people, who are believed to be Chinese citizens, found in a truck near London, said they had arrested two people on Friday on suspicion of human trafficking and continued to interrogate the driver as a murder suspect .

When China asked Britain to seek "severe punishments" for those involved in the deaths, police said they had arrested a man and a woman, both 38, in Warrington, northwest England, on suspicion of conspiracy to traffic people and 39 charges. of involuntary manslaughter.

The 25-year-old truck driver remains in custody after being arrested after the grim discovery of the bodies in the back of his refrigerated truck in the early hours of Wednesday.

He has not been formally identified, but a source familiar with the investigation named him as Mo Robinson of the Portadown area in Northern Ireland. Detectives will decide later whether to charge him with a crime, release him or ask the court for more time to interrogate him.

Late Thursday, the British authorities moved 11 of the victims, 31 men and eight women, to a hospital morgue from a safe place on the docks near the industrial estate in Grays, about 30 kilometers east of London, where the bodies were found.

Post-mortem examinations began to determine how they died exactly while forensic experts sought to identify the deceased, which the police warned would be a lengthy process.

British police said they believed the victims were Chinese and the Chinese embassy in London said they had sent a team to Essex. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said police had not yet been able to verify the nationalities of the deceased.

"We hope that the British side can confirm and verify the identities of the victims as soon as possible, determine what happened and severely punish the criminals involved in the case," he told a daily press conference.

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For years, illegal immigrants have tried to reach Britain hidden in trucks, often from the European continent. In 2000, 58 Chinese were found dead in a tomato truck in the port of Dover.

From China Global times, which is published by the ruling communist party officer People's DiaryHe said in an editorial on Friday that Britain should assume some responsibility for the deaths.

"It is clear that Britain and the relevant European countries have not fulfilled their responsibility to protect these people from such death," the tabloid newspaper said.

He added that Britain seemed not to have learned the lesson of the Dover incident two decades ago.

"Could the British and Europeans wonder why they couldn't avoid a similar tragedy … Did they take all the serious corrective measures they could take?" He said.

Truck movements

The police investigation focuses on the movement of the trailer before its arrival at the Purfleet docks near Grays just over an hour before the bodies were found, and who was behind the alleged traffic of people.

"This is the largest investigation of its kind that the Essex police have had to carry out and it is likely that it will take considerable time to reach a conclusion," said Essex police chief Ben-Julian Harrington.

His strength has said that his priority was to guarantee respect and compassion in the treatment of victims.

The Irish company Global Trailer Rentals said it owned the trailer and had rented it on October 15. The firm said it was not aware of what it would be used for.

The refrigeration unit had traveled to Britain from Zeebrugge in Belgium and the city's president, Dirk de Fauw, said he believed the victims died in the trailer before arriving at the Belgian port.

the Times The newspaper reported that GPS data showed that the container had reached the Belgian port at 2.49 p. m. Tuesday local time before making the 10-hour sea crossing to Britain.

Police said the truck's taxi unit was driven from Dublin on Sunday, crossing the Irish Sea by boat and entering Britain in North Wales. He picked up the trailer at Purfleet shortly after midnight on Wednesday.

The National Crime Agency, which focuses on serious and organized crime, said it was helping the investigation and working urgently to identify any gang involved.

The head of the Road Transport Association said that traffickers were "improving their game" and that closer cooperation with European nations was needed, although that can be complicated by Britain's planned exit from the European Union.