The Latgale District Court has sentenced a man to five years in prison for illegally transporting people across the border, LETA reported on 20th December.
The indictment states that the person created an organised group on the Telegram app to illegally transport people from Belarus to European Union member states, according to the prosecutor’s office.
In August this year, this person contacted the defendant on Telegram, who agreed to the offer to transport migrants from the Latvian-Belarusian border to Rīga, receiving €450 for each person transported.
The accused’s duties included meeting them at a specified place and time and transporting them by car to a specified location, as well as sending a video recording or photograph confirming the transport of illegal migrants.
The accused arrived at the designated location in Ludza municipality, where he picked up five border crossers and drove to the designated location in RÄ“zekne. The migrants were then to be taken to RÄ«ga, where they would be handed over to another member of the organised group. On the way to their final destination, the accused dropped off four of the migrants and drove into the courtyard of a house, where he was detained together with one of them.
A total of 11,953 people have been prevented from illegally crossing the Latvian-Belarusian border this year. However, for humanitarian reasons, 31 of them have been allowed to cross.
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