Ethiopian police arrest human trafficking ring responsible for 3,000 victims

Ethiopian police said they arrested a "dangerous international human trafficker" and nine accomplices accused of smuggling over 3,000 people to Libya, where they were held hostage and, in some cases, tortured, raped, or killed.

The human trafficking network has been under investigation since 2018, police said in a statement posted on Facebook on Tuesday, recruiting young people from Ethiopia, Sudan, Eritrea, Djibouti, Kenya, and Somalia who hoped to migrate to Europe through Libya.

The ring operated five warehouses in Libya, holding victims hostage while forcing their families to pay huge ransoms.

Those who could not pay were given only one meagre meal a day, beaten, whipped with rubber or electric cables, and had their hands and feet chained, police added.

Some victims were burned with plastic water bottles, women were raped, and many died during the torture.

"They engaged in illegally trafficking more than 3,000 people, killing over 100 people, and raping more than 50 women," the police statement read.

Police published mugshots of the seven men and three women arrested in connection with the criminal network.

The Ethiopian federal police, with support from Project ROCK, an EU-funded Interpol initiative, interviewed over 100 victims and their families during the investigation.

They found that the network moved around $20 million through its operations.

Police said the probe had also uncovered more than 70 major human traffickers in Ethiopia and abroad.