TRNC police arrest 9 trafficked persons, detains them

The Crimes Prevention team of the Lefkosa Police Directorate have arrested 9 people including 2 women who were trafficked into the country at the Tatarosu village shore on Tuesday. 

Those arrested is said to have fallen victims in the hands of human traffickers. 

The arrested which include 2 Cameroonian, 3 Ivorians, 3 Congolese and 1 other from another African country were arrested on Tuesday but the traffickers escaped. They were arraigned in a Famagusta court.

Police said they found, 3 life jackets on the suspects and an abandoned rental car used by the traffickers. 

According to suspects, they were to go to Turkey through Cyprus and then enter Belgium and while waiting to go to Turkey. they were arrested. 

According to their confession, they fled death from their country and had been in south Cyprus where they met Ali and Ahmed who called on two smugglers to take them to north Cyprus where they could been taken to Turkey and then Belgium.

The arrested, Gabriel Eloundou (23), Zoumana Diomande (35), Fanta Sidibe (31), Fatoumata Cisse (25), Yanniek Ayissi (35), Lohango Ohomi (30), Ndome Vieky (38), Noumbe Mbaııa and Paul Ngasa (31), all said they were going to Belgium when they found themselves in prison.

One of the arrested, Lohango Ohomi, explaining the situation said he lost his father in a war and was going to Belgium to see his family.

I came to the north thanks to Ali. Before going to Turkey now and then to Belgium. My father's family is there, I do not know what happened to mother. I'm out of the war. They say to us, 'We will pick you up' and leave the shore and go. Soon after, we heard gunshots, the cops caught us.

Another suspect, Noumb Mbaııa said he had been in south Cyprus for one year, noting that there are massacres in his country Congo and according to him, he paid $ 300 to one Ali, whom he met through a friend in the South, to go to Turkey.
 
Paul Ngasada said, "We came to the north from the south and stayed in a house in a village there for 2-3 weeks."

The previous day, Ali and Ahmet said, 'We are ready to go,' and one of them is white and the other is black. We squeezed tight in the vehicle used while Ali and Ahmet used another. After about an hour and a half the sound of the waves was heard. There was a blue pick-up in which 4 people were inside. Sir, I do not know what the four people there are doing. They let us down and they fled back.

The court judge ordered that all those arrested remain in police custody for two more days while investigation continues.