Federal police in Germany have uncovered an unusual form of migrant smuggling. An Iraqi family of four landed at Munich airport on Friday with a private jet. They first posed as diplomats, but then said they were fleeing their own family and paid a trafficker €60,000 so he'd bring them from Istanbul to Germany.
€60,000 -- that's how much a father from Iraq paid, by his own account, to have him and his family flown from Istanbul to Munich in Germany so they can request asylum there.
Federal police at Munich airport on Monday (October 12) said the 49-year-old on Friday had landed with a private jet in Munich together with his 44-year-old wife and his two children, aged 12 and seven.
During border control, the father tried to make the officers believe he and his wife were diplomats on their way to the Caribbean island of Dominica -- except that their documents and their story didn't match.
According to at least two media outlets, none of the family members being able to speak the diplomatic languages French or English also made the officers skeptical.
Family sold all their belongings
The parents then conceded they were fleeing from the woman's father, who demanded that her and her seven-year-old daughter be circumcised.
That's why the parents had sold their house in northern Iraq and fled with their two children to Turkey, where they paid a human trafficker the equivalent of €60,000 for a flight to Munich. At least two media outlets reported that the trafficker in question was Syrian.
After the questioning, the Iraqi family was reportedly brought to an anchor center for asylum seekers in Bavaria. They are expected to stay there until a decision about their asylum request has been made.
This piece is based on an article by Süddeutsche Zeitung from October 13