Italian police on Tuesday arrested three suspected Ukrainian people traffickers in the southern Puglia region accused of transporting 38 Kurdish migrants from Turkey last week, the Gazzetta del Mezzogiorno newspaper reported on its website.
The three Ukrainians, aged 30, 43 and 44 were detained in the province of Foggia after an Italian finance police patrol boat intercepted a luxury yacht adrift off Puglia's Gargano peninsula with the suspects on board.
Hours earlier, the 38 Kurdish migrants including 11 women and 17 children were picked up on a coastal road on the Gargano.
The yacht set sale from the Turkish coast a week ago with the Kurdish migrants aboard after they paid the alleged traffickers between 7, 000 and 11,000 euros each for their passage to Italy, police investigators believe.
