Europol Launches JOT to Combat Illegal Sea Migration

 

Hosted at Europol headquarters in The Hague, JOT Mare will combine Europol’s intelligence resources and the EU Member States’ capabilities to carry out coordinated and intelligence-driven actions against the facilitators.

 

According to Europol, organized criminal groups are actively facilitating the transport of irregular migrants and the groups have also been linked to human trafficking, drugs, firearms and terrorism.

 

The influx of migrants via the Mediterranean Sea has been exponentially rising, with 220,000 migrants crossing in 2014. Apart from putting intense immigration pressure on countries such as Greece and Italy, before the migrants arrive they have often taken very risky journeys across the Mediterranean to get there.

 

The new initiative will coordinate Europol's intelligence resources and member states' capabilities to tackle the criminal groups. Europol director Rob Wainwright said: "The tragedies we have seen at sea involving migrants requires prompt and coordinated action at EU level.

 

“This dedicated maritime intelligence centre, hosted and supported by Europol, has great potential: it will reinforce our actions against people smugglers; against the ruthless criminals who facilitate irregular migration to Europe through the Mediterranean Sea,” European Commissioner for Migration, Home Affairs and Citizenship Dimitris Avramopoulos said.

 

”We will continue to encourage close cooperation among all national and European stakeholders, in order to pursue further our common objectives and to deliver concrete results.”

 

The unit will be working closely with the EU’s border surveillance agency, Frontex, and with Interpol, the international police agency based in Lyon, France, along with the following 13 member states: Belgium, Cyprus, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Malta, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.