The Kosovo Police and the Special Prosecution of the Republic of Kosovo, respectively, the Directorate for Investigation of Organized Crime, have carried out a second successful operation against two criminal groups involved in document forgery and migrant smuggling.

The criminal group was mainly falsifying passports of different countries that are part of the European Union, StudyinPoland.Info reports.

In a press release, the Kosovo Police announced that the first operation took place back on October 29, 2020. During this operation, they searched five different locations, where three suspects were arrested. Whereas, on the recent operation that took place on March 24, 2021, the police searched 12 different locations and arrested nine suspects, while another two have already been released.

The police further informed that on both operations, during the search of 17 locations, they identified several facilities equipped with appliances and resources used for manufacturing hundreds of different forged documents such as passports, identification cards, and driving licenses.

All of the forged documents were from more than 16 different countries, mainly the EU Member States.

During the two operations, the police arrested 12 suspected individuals in total who are being held in custody by order of the prosecutor. Meanwhile, the other suspects are being held in detention by order of the Court.

“In both operations, the investigation was undertaken in cooperation with EUROPOL, Albania, and several other EU countries,” the Kosovo Police commented on the action.

As evidence, the police confiscated all of the equipment and materials used to commit the crime, as well as they seized the forged documents and other material shreds of evidence.

In order to tackle such illegal activities, the European Commission has been working on an initiative since 2017 to identify the authenticity of different documents. This form of security’s main feature is the use of ultraviolet light sources, watermarks, and biometrics of documents where the chip cannot be falsified.

The EU also funded the ANDRUPOS project, which helps in analyzing documents instantly.

“Thanks to our disruptive technology, document biometrics can be checked by anyone who scans a document, potentially leading to millions of checks daily in Europe and around the world. We focused on the two most pertinent threats affecting citizens and businesses: document fraud and counterfeiting,” the project coordinator Jan Schloen said.

Similar cases of document forgery were reported in other countries as well. In February 2021, the European police disbanded a criminal network that was abusing around 150 illegal Moldovan immigrant construction workers who were smuggled through Europe while using fake passports to work on building sites in France.