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UK agencies played key role in Italian mistaken identity case
Source: The Guardian
UK agencies played key role in Italian mistaken identity case
Medhanie Tesfamariam Berhe wrongly arrested based on tipoffs from NCA and GCHQ
Jamie Grierson Home affairs correspondent
@JamieGrierson
Fri 12 Jul 2019 16.23 BST Last modified on Fri 12 Jul 2019 18.00 BST
The acquittal of Medhanie Tesfamariam Berhe by an Italian court of being a human trafficking kingpin is a major embarrassment for Britain’s National Crime Agency and the GCHQ intelligence service.
Berhe’s arrest in 2016 was trumpeted as a major coup in the battle against international people-smuggling, but unbeknown to them at the time, the Italian and British authorities had mistaken the Eritrean for one of the world’s most-wanted human traffickers, Medhanie Yehdego Mered, aka the General.
Berhe was arrested after the NCA, an agency colloquially referred to as Britain’s FBI, and thenational cyber-security centre GCHQ, tipped off Sudanese national police that “Mered” was holed up at an address in Khartoum.
It is understood the NCA provided Italian prosecutors with the phone number of Berhe rather than Mered, which led to his arrest.
In June 2016, the NCA, which includes countering modern slavery and human trafficking within its remit, boasted that “one of the world’s most wanted people smugglers” had been arrested as a result of its intelligence.
-snip-
Medhanie Tesfamariam Berhe wrongly arrested based on tipoffs from NCA and GCHQ
Jamie Grierson Home affairs correspondent
@JamieGrierson
Fri 12 Jul 2019 16.23 BST Last modified on Fri 12 Jul 2019 18.00 BST
The acquittal of Medhanie Tesfamariam Berhe by an Italian court of being a human trafficking kingpin is a major embarrassment for Britain’s National Crime Agency and the GCHQ intelligence service.
Berhe’s arrest in 2016 was trumpeted as a major coup in the battle against international people-smuggling, but unbeknown to them at the time, the Italian and British authorities had mistaken the Eritrean for one of the world’s most-wanted human traffickers, Medhanie Yehdego Mered, aka the General.
Berhe was arrested after the NCA, an agency colloquially referred to as Britain’s FBI, and thenational cyber-security centre GCHQ, tipped off Sudanese national police that “Mered” was holed up at an address in Khartoum.
It is understood the NCA provided Italian prosecutors with the phone number of Berhe rather than Mered, which led to his arrest.
In June 2016, the NCA, which includes countering modern slavery and human trafficking within its remit, boasted that “one of the world’s most wanted people smugglers” had been arrested as a result of its intelligence.
-snip-
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/jul/12/uk-agencies-played-key-role-in-italian-mistaken-identity-case