 Of course, October 2015, he briefed the statement, topic from Syria to the EU, higher facilitators in Germany, Turkey, and Greece. Man, 23 years, 24 years old, Syrian. Quote, being not safe in Syria, in danger of my life, every day I wanted to leave. I had to leave. I wanted to find a safe harbor in the European Union. I called my friend in Germany, and he told me that he knew someone in Stuttgart, a Syrian Lebanese citizen, that worked in a Lebanese restaurant. That person was in contact with someone in Istanbul, who could help me to come to Europe via Turkey and Greece. I had to pay 2,000 euros. I had to send the money via Western Union to his friend that worked in that restaurant in Germany. I asked my friend in Germany if this was a safe way. He told me that many people are doing this, and that the Syrian Lebanese from the restaurant helped many people. I was also told to destroy all contact numbers before my arrival in Greece, or that otherwise I would be punished by the smugglers. After my arrival in Greece, I would receive information via Facebook how to continue my travel. I managed to get the money in by selling everything ahead and leaving everything behind. Ten days after I sent the money, I received instructions and tickets and traveled to Istanbul, and then to Izmir. When I arrived in Izmir, I had to stay in a hotel until I was contacted by Abu Saleem. Abu Saleem arrived one day later and asked me again another 500 euros to go to Greece. You went in a taxi from Izmir to the sea. I was told not to carry any luggage. I had to see a very young boy who was waiting to bring me to a rubber boat. I had to pay again 500 euros to get him into the boat. I didn't want him, but was forced and refused first that I was forced to pay and then to step into the dangerous rubber boat together with 29 other people. Unquote. These words of a migrant showed that we as an international law and forced community are comfortated with a well-organized and ruthless enemy. Criminal groups hesitate and benefit from mass migration movements. They exploit desperate people, escaping war, chaos, and violence. Dear Secretary General Stock, dear Minister Executive Secretary eBay, dear members of the Executive Committee and distinguished colleagues, I'm delighted to open together with Jürgen Stock the operational forum on country migrants' migrant networks. It is a joint event as already was highlighted of Interpol and your call together and in that way also underlining our excellent and close cooperation. We meet here today and tomorrow to discuss concrete challenges we face on a daily basis. We meet here also to build mutual understanding and trust. We share the same objectives and recognize the same values. We all want to see criminal networks behind dismantled and their members behind bars. The idea of this, to organize this joint meeting of senior police officers from source, transit, and destination countries was developing as it was being said before, a meeting between Secretary General Stock and your poll director, Robert Rehmert, only a few weeks ago. And indeed, the joint resources of Interpol, the world's largest law enforcement organization, and of your poll as the European Union's information hub and operational law enforcement support unit should be fully used to support national law enforcement and authorities throughout the world. Because indeed there is an unprecedented increase in the number of migrants and refugees attempting to enter Europe, and it has led to an unprecedented scale of criminal activity, levels recorded at your poll are at all time high level. And this is not a surprise. Modern enterprise and organized crime groups go where opportunities, where the opportunities are high and the risk is low. And many of the criminals involved are also new in the business of people's money. About one third of the groups that we are facing are involved in other criminal activities like drugs, money laundering, THP. And especially in this field where also among the travelers, the migrants are more than 7,000, are competing at minus, there are big risk for the future. There are also larger international criminal syndicates involved made up of multiple nationalities, often with specialized allocated roles. Other innovations include increased use of social media to recruit smuggling victims. And also the business model of crime as a service is adopted by organized crime groups involved in the facilitation of illegal immigration for passports, for vessels, the means of transportation, for money transfers, all kinds of facilitating parts. They also establish legal business structures in form of recruitment or travel agencies. So the challenge for us is complex and multi-dimensional. So it also needs to be our response. Well, what is your goal doing to address the challenge? Illegal immigration has been a priority for your goal for many years. It's one of the priorities identified also under the policy cycle impact. In this context, I'm happy to see that also Interpol has joined the impact project, coordinating the EU efforts on combating the illegal facilitated immigration. But the growing scale of this challenge and the ruthless trafficking methods used by criminal groups means and meant already that we need to get stronger and even more focused, going beyond the business as usual. So in March 2015, the joint operational team MARA was established. It's a unique and also new model that combines national resources as a means and the EU policy types. Interpol was involved as of the beginning in this job. Well, this model has been effective and brought good results since it was established in March. It led to 160 identified cases and established a very rich database, which for example, 3,000 facilitators, the more than 100 suspected officials are registered. Also more than 60 websites, internet profiles linked to illegal immigration have been identified. This model focused on information exchange and it's fairly useful. So national experts are coming from the most effective states, both from line states like Italy and Greece, but also destination countries like Germany and UK greatly increased our ability to gather the right information. However, when the job was established, no underscored deployment was foreseen and also the situation was different from the situation it is now. So the mass flow of migrants and the involvement of criminal groups required quick law enforcement patrols on the front line. And also, member states within the European Union needed help and support to address the unprecedented challenge. And this is the way how the hotspot concept was developed by the European Commission. You will hear something about this later. With the right involvement of the key EU agencies on the spot. So the EU Regional Task Force, EU RTF as it is called, in Patanien, Auckland in June, is providing a new platform for inter-agency population with front-experts with the AISO and also with the UNIFORP and offering direct support to the front line member states. Another such hotspot will be open to the pirates in Greece. But of course, none of Greece is very different and there is also a different way to attack the problem over there. So the scale of our support is to increase. As soon as also a coordinated EU action might be required elsewhere in other countries. And as the traffickers respond quickly to our actions, secondary movements also need to be addressed. And that means that the demand on your call or by the departments is rising. And the number of cases is at all time high, including high-profile investigations. Requests coming in to help provide an EU-wide overview of the traveling also meant that we had to step up in this field. And we opened a permanent situation monitoring center with daily reports of the ongoing traveling of migrants and the involvement of organized crime. So all those demands are pushing us towards upgrading our efforts. And also not only within internal arrangement, but also opening a new way for approach that we call the European Migrant Migrant Center that will be opened at EUROFORP. And also using the experience we already had from other fields like cyber intervention. Such a center should have an adequate resource and capability. The commission has already proposed necessary changes for your call and we will receive 13 new staff for this center. But the establishment of the European Migrant Migrant Center will strengthen our ability to offer an unstoppable support, but also will make our need for information even higher. So it's also needed to strengthen our partnerships, in particular with Interpol, but also with third countries. And as you know, our legal framework is not always easy to cooperate with third states, but with the help I think and the construction of working together with Interpol, we can overcome those difficulties. So we are actively developing our cooperation in third states and an excellent progress already has been made within the Western Balkans. But for many countries and particular countries of origin and transit countries, this is not the case. And at the same time, I think, to target criminal groups, really effective, we need to understand the structure and models of harmony along the entire trafficking routes. And that's, I think, something we have to understand. The operations against criminal network must be based on good quality intelligence or names on individuals, the role in criminal groups, the vessels that have been used, the financing methods, the routes the communication needs, the presence online, et cetera, et cetera. And that's something we have to bring together with all countries involved. So as Europol has tools to support European member states and ensure also the position to ensure current or European response to the challenge, we can support them with expertise, but that's not enough. The challenge goes beyond the EU borders and this makes the partnership with Interpol crucial. Where Europol can serve as the information hub for EU member states and a number of third parties, the cooperation agreement, Interpol can play a significant role for exchanging data with source and transit countries, facilitating the exchange of information between them, but also making sure that information relevant for law enforcement in Europe is shared quickly. We call Interpol at Europol as our gateway to the world and that's also the reason that we have a permanent liaison officer here at the office. So the current price is due to its geographical dimension and still shows that our special relationship is needed more than ever. And I'm extremely pleased with the fact that Interpol and the help of my staff were able to organize this conference within a few weeks' time. I think we can serve our respective members only in close cooperation. So in that way also, Europol welcomes the endeavors of Interpol towards the establishment of a specialist operational network against migrant smuggling and is also looking forward to closely work together with it. This might be a powerful tool, linking investigations along the trafficking routes, connecting between all dots and countries of origin, transit, and destination. It should be closely connected to Europol's new migrant smuggling center, providing the data but also benefit from our expertise and other capabilities. As agreed by Secretary General Jürgen Stock and also Rob Reinhardt, an Interpol, Europol, follow-up meeting will be organized in due course in early 2016. But the conference we open today and the next meeting at Europol should help identify concrete ways to strengthen our operational corporations. Both organizations have unique tools, capabilities, and strength. The current demigration crisis is an opportunity to show the synergy and coherence of our actions. So at the end, we can better serve the national law enforcing protocols. And I sincerely hope that this event today will deepen our cooperation and strengthen our mutual trust, not only between the agencies, but also between all member states and third parties involved. And this is really a precondition for sharing more information and after having had this trust between us, also undertaking concrete actions in the joint fight against migration crime. Well, in saying this, I would like to see at the end of our 2D meeting that we would be a little closer to each other, that we have built on this trust, that we have identified a way to share information, but also that this will lead in undertake concrete actions. Thank you for now. We wish you a very successful conference for the next week. Thank you.