Introduction

Abstract

During the evening of Saturday, 7 September 2002, police forces from ten countries in Southeast Europe¹ launched Operation Mirage, a week-long, region-wide operation against trafficking in human beings and illegal migration. All throughout that night, the police conducted extensive searches and raided ‘hotels, discothèques, night-bars, parking lots, border points and other various places known to law enforcement as possibilities where criminal activity takes place’ (SECI Centre, 2003). Similar actions targeting the recruitment and transportation of potential victims were carried out for a week: artistic management companies, transportation, employment and other agencies were investigated; vehicle searches, passport and document checks and surveillance at the border were intensified; and large numbers of suspects were intercepted while travelling. Information exchanges between police forces helped uncover particular trafficking routes and in some cases resulted in arrests of traffickers and the rescue of victims in those countries and elsewhere in Europe.