Two Lebanese alleged people smugglers arrested in Cyprus

A Cypriot court on Saturday ordered two Lebanese men to be held in custody for six days on suspicion of human trafficking, the Associated Press reports.

The two men have been identified as the captains of two boats that transported 146 Syrian refugees and one Lebanese migrant to the island.

"The suspects are Lebanese nationals aged 19 and 21," said the police.

According to the police, "the illegal immigrants confessed during questioning that they had left the city of Tripoli, in North Lebanon, on Thursday, Feb. 22, and that they had paid $2,500 each for a place on the boats."

One of the boats was carrying 30 people, including six women and 11 minors, and the second was carrying 117 people, including eight women and 17 minors.

Cypriot police spotted the two boats on Saturday afternoon off Cape Greco, on the southeastern tip of the island. All the migrants were escorted to shore, then transferred to a reception center outside the capital, Nicosia.

In Cyprus, boat arrivals from Syria and Lebanon have been on the increase. Last year, the UN refugee agency expressed concern over the return of more than 100 Syrian migrants to Lebanon, claiming that they had not been screened to determine whether they needed legal protection or were at risk of deportation to their country of origin.

Migrants, asylum seekers and refugees leaving Lebanon by boat are generally looking for a better life in Europe, and often head for Cyprus, an island on the front line of migratory flows within the European Union. Nicosia has for years been calling for more funding and political support from Brussels to deal with this issue. The authorities claim that asylum seekers account for 5 percent of the 915,000 inhabitants of the southern part of the island.

The central Mediterranean is considered the world's most dangerous migration route, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM).