Police flag situation during operation “to inspect foreign nationals in municipality of Almeirim”
The GNR has identified three men who they suspect of being in a situation analogous to slavery, during an operation to inspect foreign nationals in the municipality of Almeirim, the National Republican Guard said in a statement today.
“During the operation, 49 foreign nationals were inspected, between the ages of 12 and 72, and ten notices of violation were drawn up for failure to report entry into national territory after a period of three working days.
“Three men were also identified because they were suspected of being victims of the crime of trafficking in human beings,” said the statement.
The operation checking on foreign citizens was carried by the Santarém territorial command on Thursday, through the Santarém territorial detachment and the GNR’s coastal and border control unit, through the Santarém territorial immigration inspection center.
“Five establishments were also inspected and five administrative offense notices were issued in this regard,” the statement went on.
The inspection was reinforced by agents from the Santarém intervention detachment, and also had the support of “elements from the Tax Authority”.
The bottom line was that the GNR “warns of the need to report suspicious situations of human trafficking (…) in order to guarantee the safety of the population most vulnerable to this type of crime”.
Almeirim has been the focus of a number of police operations in the recent past, all of them centered on identifying situations of foreigners in Portugal ‘illegally’ and/ or without legal work contracts.
Source material: LUSA
