A 30-year-old Bulgarian man was jailed for two years on January 21 after a French court found him guilty of illegally transporting Vietnamese immigrants.
A group of 10 Vietnamese nationals had been caught as they were about to be smuggled into the United Kingdom in a van driven by the Bulgarian man.
On January 16, police officers in Cherbourg, France spotted a wooden partition in a van that was on its way to the United Kingdom, VN Express reported. Upon searching the vehicle, 10 Vietnamese individuals were found behind the wooden panel, which had holes drilled in it to allow them to breathe.
The driver of the vehicle, a 30-year-old Bulgarian, was jailed for two years on January 21 after a court found him guilty for illegally transporting immigrants. He was also banned from the Channel between France and the United Kingdom for five years.
He told the court that a taxi driver in Sofia, Bulgaria had paid him 500 Euros (US$600) to bring the van from France to Manchester for repair works.
He also claimed not to have not known about the Vietnamese in the van.