Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer will sign new agreements on intercepting criminal people smuggling gangs with Western Balkan nations in a bid to tackle illegal immigration.

Starmer will sign deals with North Macedonia, Serbia, and Kosovo which will increase intelligence-sharing and cooperation, leading to the interception and arrest of criminal gangs who smuggle illegal immigrants through these countries.

The government sees cooperation with these nations as key, as almost 100,000 illegal immigrants moved through the Western Balkans last year on their way to the EU and UK. The measures form part of the new Labour administration’s strategy to break the gangs’ business models “at source.”

Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said that work with the Balkan nations is “absolutely key to dismantling the criminal networks that orchestrate the exploitation of vulnerable people for financial gain.”

Cooper continued: “Working more closely with Serbia, North Macedonia and Kosovo, we will share information and intelligence, and work across borders to map out what is happening and where, to break the business models of these unscrupulous gangs at source.

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“Through our intensified work, criminals will soon realise they have nowhere to hide.”

‘Criminal Empire’

Starmer said ahead of the EPC meeting, “There is a criminal empire operating on our continent, exacting a horrendous human toll and undermining our national security.”

He added: “Backed by our new Border Security Command, the UK will be at the heart of the efforts to end the scourge of organised immigration crime – but we cannot do it in isolation.

“We need to go further and faster, alongside our international partners, and take the fight directly to the heart of these vile people smuggling networks.”

“We’re going to treat people smugglers like terrorists. So we’re taking our approach to counter-terrorism—which we know works—and applying it to the gangs, with our new Border Security Command,” Starmer told representatives from around 190 countries at the Interpol summit.

To meet those ends, the prime minister announced that funding for the multi-agency Border Security Command will be doubled to £150 million over the next two years.

Starmer said this additional £75 billion would support the recruitment of hundreds of specialist investigators and intelligence officers and a new Organised Immigration Crime intelligence unit, all of which will be supported with new technology.

The court sentenced 17 members—13 of which were from Iraq and the others from France, Poland, the Netherlands, and Iran—to between two and 10 years in prison. One of the gang leaders, also from Iraq, was sentenced to 15 years in jail and fined 200,000 euros (£166,250).

The investigation into the people smuggling racket was a joint effort between French and British authorities—France’s national policing unit specialising in immigration crime, OLTIM, and the UK’s NCA—as well as other international partners.

The criminal network is believed to have smuggled 10,000 illegal immigrants to the UK, via small boat in the English channel.