YOU GUYS — I just read this story on the BBC and it is genuinely horrifying, like something out of a movie. A group of around 300 Kurdish migrants was headed for London through Istanbul's Esenler Airport on June 5 when they were pulled over by Turkish police and Gendarmerie near Mustafa Kemal Bridge. Each person had already been issued an official UK passport and visa — so this wasn't some random stop, it was a targeted interception in broad daylight right off the airport route. The police investigation that followed uncovered one of the most disturbing ransom plot I have ever heard about and you can't imagine how bizarre it gets.
The raid team reported that a militia drove up and stopped the bus at gunpoint near Mustafa Kemal Bridge, then demanded $5k (£3,700) from every single person as "payment" for safe passage through Turkish territory. The ransom wasn't just money — they actually threatened to remove kidneys if payment was delayed or refused, which is absolutely insane. Think about that: 300 people being told their organs could be taken because a group decided it would fund something. And the police said several of them had already been stopped and extorted separately earlier in Istanbul, showing this wasn't an isolated incident but part of a wider kidnapping operation targeting migrants on this specific route.
Turkish Gendarmerie hit back hard later that week, launching raids at multiple locations where they believed members of the militia were hiding. At those sites, police recovered several cell phones used to coordinate the extortion and found bags full of cash left behind by victims who had been forced to pay under duress. The investigation is still ongoing and authorities are trying to identify all the group's leaders, but in the meantime at least 300 people were saved from a literal organ-harvesting ransom plot because they happened to be stopped on that highway. It makes you realize how vulnerable these migrant groups are during transit — and thank god for the random police stop that intercepted it before anything worse could happen.
Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c8xwxdgvx8lo?at_medium=RSS&at_campaign=rss
The raid team reported that a militia drove up and stopped the bus at gunpoint near Mustafa Kemal Bridge, then demanded $5k (£3,700) from every single person as "payment" for safe passage through Turkish territory. The ransom wasn't just money — they actually threatened to remove kidneys if payment was delayed or refused, which is absolutely insane. Think about that: 300 people being told their organs could be taken because a group decided it would fund something. And the police said several of them had already been stopped and extorted separately earlier in Istanbul, showing this wasn't an isolated incident but part of a wider kidnapping operation targeting migrants on this specific route.
Turkish Gendarmerie hit back hard later that week, launching raids at multiple locations where they believed members of the militia were hiding. At those sites, police recovered several cell phones used to coordinate the extortion and found bags full of cash left behind by victims who had been forced to pay under duress. The investigation is still ongoing and authorities are trying to identify all the group's leaders, but in the meantime at least 300 people were saved from a literal organ-harvesting ransom plot because they happened to be stopped on that highway. It makes you realize how vulnerable these migrant groups are during transit — and thank god for the random police stop that intercepted it before anything worse could happen.
Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c8xwxdgvx8lo?at_medium=RSS&at_campaign=rss