Fury as legal loophole thwarts UK efforts to end Channel migrant crisis allowing smuggling gangs to get boats in GERMANY

GERMANY must plug a legal loophole thwarting Sir Keir Starmer’s pledge to smash people-trafficking gangs, the boss of our National Crime Agency has revealed.

It is not illegal to transport migrants through Germany to a non-EU nation — which includes the UK — since Brexit.

And gangs raking in millions from desperate refugees are dodging justice by storing boats within German borders just a three-hour drive from the Channel coast.

In an exclusive interview, NCA Director General Graeme Biggar said the loophole is affecting the Government’s anti-gang drive.

Mr Biggar said: “We have to operate with the laws that exist in all the countries that we work with and we have to have respect for their different systems.

“But that does limit what the German law enforcement are able to do in support of us. Within the legal framework that they have, they are working incredibly hard.

‘Trail of destruction’

“They have a very significant illegal migration challenge themselves that they are dealing with and so we really are grateful for the support that we get.

“But it is a point we make to them constantly and it would be helpful if they were able to do slightly more.

“It’s obviously a matter for the German government to decide but from our point of view a law change would be helpful.”

Dinghies made in China are shipped to Turkey over 3,500 miles after being ordered by smuggling gangs, then driven to Germany.

They are stored in a network of warehouses in western Germany ready to be sold to accomplices or migrant groups and ferried through Holland and Belgium by road to the French Channel coast.

They can either be inflated in the German warehouses before making the trip to the French coast, or once transported to the Channel.

From there they are launched on the perilous 22-mile crossing to Kent.

Mr Biggar raised his concerns during the Interpol General Assembly held in Glasgow this week.

Last night, Tory MP Sir Alec Shelbrooke said: “Being a member of the EU should be irrelevant to the conversation about how any moral country can look away from the exploitation of vulnerable people dying in their dozens every year.”

Fellow Tory MP Karen Bradley, chairwoman of the Home Affairs Select Committee, said: “Stopping the dreadful and dangerous trade of people smuggling should be a global priority and law enforcement needs all the tools available.”

Mr Biggar was backed by Richard Chambers, Interpol’s Director of Organised and Emerging Crime, who told The Sun on Sunday that gangs were profiting from the loophole.

Mr Chambers said: “When it comes to organised crime around the world, there are a lot of vulnerabilities, there are a lot of opportunities and they will seek those out.

“They don’t care what the trail of destruction is.”

The German connection was highlighted as PM Sir Keir vowed to smash gangs who have already ferried more than 31,000 migrants across the Channel this year.

He has pleaded for improved cooperation between European nations along smuggling routes after scrapping the Tories’ Rwanda scheme.

But German government officials have argued their nation is not a geographical neighbour with the UK, so “no direct smuggling” takes place.

A BBC investigation revealed last month that gang masters based in the German city of Essen were offering £12,500 package deals to would-be traffickers.

The deal offered to an undercover reporter included a dinghy with an outboard motor and 60 life jackets, with the boat delivered by road to Calais.

And traffickers stand to rake in up to £100,000 for each potentially deadly trip by charging 60 passengers £1,660 each.

A deal was also offered to the BBC investigator in which he was told he could pick up a boat himself to drive from Germany to the French coast for £6,670.

The probe revealed Germany has become a central location for storage of boats and engines.

An Essen-based trafficker calling himself Abu Sahar offered a BBC investigator a boat stored in one of the ten warehouses used by his gang nearby.

The smugglers also boasted of their ability to get boats and engines to Calais within “three-four hours” on motorways.

German police have effectively turned a blind eye to trafficking activities even when finding dozens of boats stored within their borders.

BBC Berlin correspondent Jessica Parker explained, “The facilitation of people smuggling is not technically illegal in Germany if it is to a third country outside the EU, which the UK now is after Brexit”.

The interior ministry in Berlin says Germany and the UK are not geographical neighbours so “no direct smuggling” takes place — and this is the loophole Starmer and NCA chief Mr Biggar are determined to work around.

Last year, German police arrested a key member of one gang named as “Dirk P”, 41, suspected of being the gangs’ logistics coordinator.

Around 50 dinghies and 920 life jackets were found on his farm at Lotte, 80 miles from Essen — but no action was taken against him.

‘Prevent threats’

He was linked to Channel-crossing gangs by mobile phone data but claimed he was renting out the warehouse and was not a trafficker.

But the investigation was stepped up after a smuggler shot near the dinghy store cooperated with cops.

Dirk was held on firearms and gang-related charges after three guns were found at his property, but not accused of people-smuggling offences.

Around 700 German cops joined an operation in February across more than 20 towns and cities in North Rhine Westphalia, near Essen, targeting traffickers.

Germany’s interior ministry has also insisted its international cooperation was “very good” and stressed German authorities can take action at the request of the UK.

A spokesman added that while it is not illegal to aid smuggling from Germany to the UK, it is punishable to aid smuggling to Belgium or France, where crossings take place.

A spokesman for the State Office of Criminal Investigation in North Rhine-Westphalia said: “The smuggling of persons from the territory of the EU to Great Britain is no longer a criminal offence in Germany after Brexit.

This means that possession of the means of offence — for example, boats — is not a criminal offence for the time being.

“The prosecution of smuggling gangs is the direct responsibility of the Federal Police.”

A Federal Police spokesman said: “We are focusing on combating smuggling crime, including in the English Channel.

“The law enforcement measures are carried out both to prevent threats as well as based on police laws of the federal states and the federal government.”

French authorities working with British gangbusters have also called for more German action.

Pascal Marconville, a prosecutor in northern France, said: “It is important to demonstrate to the Germans that these boats are linked to offences on our coasts, which will allow them to intervene.”