Attentive soldiers

“Taxi driver” in Burgenland unmasked as smuggler

The number of arrests of people smugglers in Burgenland has fallen sharply.(Bild: Christian Schulter)

Only a few cases of illegal migration still occupy the police on the border with Hungary. This year's first arrest of an accomplice of a smuggling gang has now been made in Burgenland.

Such operations used to be on the agenda, but are now rare. 17 refugees were apprehended in Burgenland last week. In the previous seven days, 29 had been reported. This year there have been 135 migrants so far. This keeps the number of registrations within limits.

Suspicious car
The first smuggler arrest this year was made in Nikitsch. A pedestrian had noticed a suspicious car with distinctive license plates in Quellenstraße. The pedestrian immediately called the police. Patrol officers were able to stop the car shortly afterwards. The Syrian man behind the wheel was pretending to be a cab driver who was supposed to pick up a family from Sopron.

At the end of December 2022, there were still up to 8,000 apprehensions per month in Burgenland. There are currently just under 100 per month.(Bild: Christian Schulter, Krone KREATIV)

Dubious information
However, the 38-year-old claimed that his sat nav had mistakenly directed him to Nikitsch. The dubious information soon turned out to be false. Soldiers had discovered and picked up four refugees wandering around the border town. According to the migrants' reports, the Syrian "taxi driver" from Vienna-Liesing was their trafficker. Further investigations were carried out by the coordinated criminal investigation department in Oberpullendorf.

Massive decline
With a few exceptions, the border is currently calm. "Contrary to international trends, the number of apprehensions in this country is falling sharply. It has fallen by more than 95 percent within a year," the Ministry of the Interior reported.

Thanks to even better networked cooperation between the countries, hundreds of suspected smugglers in the Western Balkan regions and Turkey have already been taken off the streets.