Twelve migrants are found alive in refrigerated lorry in Belgium – a week after 39 people were found dead in similar truck in Britain
- Twelve Syrian and Sudanese migrants were found in a truck in Belgium today
- They have been taken to the Immigration Office in Antwerp, says spokeswoman
- Last week 39 migrants were found dead in a refrigerated truck from Belgium
Twelve migrants have been found alive inside a refrigerated truck at a motorway parking area in Belgium – one week after 39 were found dead in London.
The driver, who was transporting fruit and vegetables, called police after suspecting people were hiding in the back.
He was told to pull over into a parking area when 11 Syrian men and one Sudanese man were found inside.
They had crawled into the vehicle which was travelling along the E34 motorway at Oud-Turnhout, near Antwerp, Belgium, on Tuesday, according to local media reports.
Twelve migrants were found alive inside a refrigerated truck at a motorway parking area in Belgium. The group have been taken to the Immigration Office in Antwerp (pictured, file image)
This comes as 39 migrants were found dead in a -25 refrigerated truck after crossing from the Belgian port of Zeebrugge. Lorry driver Mo Robinson, 25, picked up the container at an Essex port and has been arrested on suspicion of murder.
The group-of-twelve are in ‘good health’ and were taken to the Immigration Office in the city of Antwerp, Belgium, today, a federal police spokeswoman told AFP.
Police are launching an investigation into how the migrants got on board and whether they were seeking to get to Britain.
Last weekend, Belgian authorities said they had found two more trucks carrying 20 migrants, all alive.
Manuel Rohrbach was travelling from Switzerland to England when he heard a noise in his trailer and pulled over near Brussels, Belgium, and found two migrants in the back, on October 18.
Robinson charged migrants £30,000 for the ‘VIP’ trip across the border and was discovered at the Port of Tilbury in Essex.
He was part of an international trafficking ring moving large numbers of people into Britain illegally, a court heard two days ago.
Shipping containers at the port of Zeebrugge in Belgium after 39 bodies were found inside a lorry that had travelled from the port to the Port of Tilbury in Essex, on October 23
This graphic shows the route which a group of 39 migrants took to England by lorry driver Mo Robinson. They were found dead inside his lorry, including Vietnamese migrants who had travelled from the Can Loc district in northern Vietnam