39 dead in trucks: What is known about the body finding of Essex

The police in the UK have discovered dozens of dead in a truck container. The vehicle was found in the night of Wednesday in an industrial area east of London, the police said in the county of Essex.

What is known about the case? The most important questions and answers.

What happened?

In Essex, 39 bodies have been found in a truck. The English county is northeast of London. The truck was found in the Waterglade Industrial Park in Grays, the police said. Rescue workers had discovered the truck at 1:40 local time and notified the police. The locality was closed off. Who alerted the emergency services, is unclear.

What is known about the dead?

According to the police, the people in the container were declared dead on the spot. According to initial findings, there are 38 adults and a teenager. Police Chief Andrew Mariner said the investigation was still in the process of identifying the victims. "However, this can take a long time."

In the case, much indicates traffickers, officially confirmed that is not yet. Many refugees have been trying for years to come secretly to the UK. Often they hide in trucks.

What do you know about the route of the truck?

The vehicle is according to investigators presumably from Bulgaria. According to initial findings, the route initially led to Ireland - how exactly, is determined. After that, the truck had come on Saturday over the port of Holyhead in Wales to the UK. This is one of the main British ports for ferries from Ireland.

If the destination was England from the beginning, the route is at least unusual - the journey over Ireland is an extra day's drive. It has been suggested that this may have been accepted in order to circumvent stricter controls in the large English port of Dover and in Calais, France.

The Bulgarian Foreign Ministry has not been able to confirm that the truck started its journey in Bulgaria. "We are still reviewing the information published in the UK media and contacting the authorities," said a spokeswoman.

Are there arrests?

The driver of the truck, a 25-year-old man from Northern Ireland, had been arrested on suspicion of murder, police said. Details of his identity are unknown. An indictment of the 25-year-olds does not exist so far.

How does the public react to the case?

Chief of police Mariner spoke of "a tragic incident in which many people have lost their lives." Investigations were under way to identify the victims.

Britain's Conservative Interior Minister Priti Patel said she was "shocked and saddened by this absolutely tragic incident".

Shocked & saddened by this utterly tragic incident in Grays. Essex Police has been arrested on individual and we must give them the space to conduct their investigations.

The background of the case is still largely unclear. Conservative MP Jackie Doyle-Price from the Thurrock constituency, where the truck was located, said in a tweet, "Trafficking in human beings is a heinous and dangerous business, and this is a big investigation for the Essex police hope they bring the killers to justice. "

I'm appalled by this tragic incident in Essex. I am working on receiving regular updates and the home office wants to work closely with Essex Police. My thoughts are with all those who lost their lives & their loved ones.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson wrote on Twitter that he was "appalled by the tragic incident in Essex" and expressed his condolences to the relatives of the dead.

Have there been similar cases in the past?

In 2000, British customs officials found the bodies of 58 Chinese in a tomato van in Dover. The case is considered the heaviest refugee tragedy in the UK.

On the way to Germany, 71 refugees died three years ago in a refrigerated truck in Austria. The parked truck with the bodies of the refugees was found on 27 August 2015 on a highway in Austria. The vehicle had left the day before in southern Hungary. The refugees in the hold were suffocated agonizingly after three hours at the latest. A Hungarian court sentenced the main suspects to long prison sentences.