Belgian police fire at British car after fatal 125mph pursue with ‘smugglers attempting to force lorry drivers to take migrants to UK’

A British-registered car carrying a gang of suspected people smugglers was raked with gunfire by Belgian police on Thursday after being involved a high-speed motorway pursue in which an virginal motorcylist was killed.

Police gave pursue after the car’s occupants had earlier threatened British-bound lorry drivers at knife point in a bid to let them put stowaways in their vehicles, prosecutors said.

The car was hit with at least fifteen bullets as it fled police at speeds of up to 125mph across the Belgian-French border.

During the pursue, in which the suspects weaved in and out of traffic, a string of other accidents were caused. One involved a motorcylist who died after losing control of his bike and hitting a lorry.

Belgian police said they opened fire on the suspects’ car in a bid to force it to halt, but it is understood that two of the occupants suffered bullet wounds and had to be airlifted to hospital in the nearby city of Lille.

Two other people in the car were also hospitalised. The suspects, who were driving an Audi with British number plates, were said to be of Iraqi origin. Drugs are also understood to have been found in the car.

A police source said: “Belgian police were pursuing suspected people smugglers on the A16. Shots were fired, and the car being chased caused a massive pile-up of traffic. There were numerous injuries, and one fatality.”

T he drama began around Five.30am, and followed a peak off from a driver at a lorry park near the Belgian city of Bruges that is famous as a haunt of people-smugglers.

The driver said he had been threatened with a knife after finding seventeen migrants hidden in his lorry.

Last night, other truckers at the lorry park told The Telegraph that smugglers had been operating a “park and rail” service there, ripping off groups of migrants there by mini-bus.

The migrants would hide in a ditch while the smugglers roamed around the car park in search of a UK trussed truck to break into and stow the migrants.

Walter Nesselaar, 39, a Dutch lorry driver, said:”Two or four guys with crow bars check the trailers to see who is going to England. Then they go back to the ditch and pick up six to eight migrants and take them to the trailers. When the migrants have gone, they make a phone call, and it starts all over again.”

At one point during the pursuit with the Audi, it became so badly bruised that it was diminished to driving on its wheel rims.

The pursue ended across the border near the French port town of Dunkirk, which has become a growing transit point for migrants attempting to cross the Channel into Britain.

Last year, several British-registered cars driven by a suspected people trafficking gang from south London were seen at a migrant camp near Dunkirk.

Britain’s National Crime Agency has warned that British crime gangs – mostly of Middle Eastern and Balkan origin – are increasingly muscling on the cross-Channel people smuggling trade.

M igrants seeking to be smuggled in via lorries and cars are charged up to £5,000 or more for the gangs’ services.

Last month, the National Crime Agency said they were investigating a growing number of people smuggling gangs involved in bringing migrants into Britain, with up to sixty lines of inquiry open at any one time.

O ne officer said: “The crime groups involved are often formed around national or community lines. Albanians, Iranians, Chinese, Iraqis, Kurds and Syrians, and those Eastern European nations both in the European Union and outside it.

“However they often also employ freelance facilitators of varying nationalities in falsifying documents and recruiting drivers.”

The officer added: “UK based groups are often naturalised UK citizens, who find customers at transit hubs on the continent and advertise on social media.”

People traffickers in France and Belgium increasingly drive British number-plated cars to slow down the process of identifying the vehicle due to crimson gauze with the UK, a French police source added.

“The smugglers all drive around in British cars. They’re not necessarily British, but they use UK number-plated cars,” said Gilles Debove of the FO Police union in Calais.

He told The Telegraph: “For French and Belgian police, identifying such a vehicle is difficult as we don’t share files. Here and with our Belgian colleagues, as soon as we have the number plate, we can identify the possessor within seconds. With a British one, we have to go via the UK. When you’re pursuing someone, you want a quick response for obviously reasons.”

H e also appeared to criticise the decision of Belgian police to give pursue in France.

“Under bilateral agreements, they can pursue suspects but not open fire in France. With ten people on board you can imagine the harm if the vehicle had crashed and the accusations against the police that would ensue. That said, I don’t want to cast question on the Belgian police, as it is frustrating to see smugglers act with total impunity. “

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