London Dozens of suspects were arrested in Britain and across Europe yesterday in one of the largest co-ordinated crackdowns on people-trafficking.

Europol said that 75 people were detained in nine countries as 1,300 officers focused on a gang believed to have smuggled a large number of illegal immigrants into the European Union at between £8,000 and £9,500 a time. Six people were arrested in Britain. The network was believed to be arranging travel from Afghanistan, China, Turkey, Bangladesh and Iraq.

In France, one of those arrested is suspected to have smuggled about 280 people in the six months between last July and January.

Most of those arrested in Operation Baghdad were of Iraqi origin, a Europol spokesman said. The migrants were taken to Ireland, Britain and Scandinavian countries. “The illegal immigrants usually travelled in cramped conditions in camping cars, coaches, or boats from Iraq via Turkey to Europe,” he said.

Arrests also took place in Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Norway, the Netherlands and Sweden.

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