In Germany, citizens of Ukraine supplanted the Syrians and took first place in the list of the main carriers of illegal migrants, whose activities were stopped in 2023. The Bild newspaper reported this on September 13, citing data from law enforcement agencies.

As noted by federal police spokesman Marcel Pretz, Syrian citizens were the main transporters of migrants in 2021 and 2022. Thus, in the federal state of Saxony in the first half of 2023, police detained 37 Ukrainian, 24 Czech and 18 Uzbek migrant carriers on the border with the Czech Republic. And on the border with Poland there are 29 Ukrainian, 19 Syrian and 11 Belarusian smugglers.

Judge from Saxony Simone Widmer confirmed that it is Ukrainians who are currently smuggling a large number of people into the region. Ukrainian carriers are recruited through social networks by their own compatriots, promising up to $2 thousand for smuggling. Criminals plan the route, prepare transport and establish contact between migrants and carriers, for which they demand €6 thousand to €10 thousand from those wishing to illegally enter Germany.

On July 30, the national police of Ukraine stated that it assessed the problem of human trafficking in the country as extremely urgent. The press service of the department noted that currently new risks in the country are the departure of Ukrainian citizens abroad, internally displaced persons, as well as the loss of housing and jobs by Ukrainians.

Last July, Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Ekaterina Pavlichenko reported that to combat human trafficking in Ukraine, a Ukrainian Task Force was created on the basis of Europol, which is tracking what happened to Ukrainians who temporarily left the country.

In March of the same year, the Geneva-based NGO Global Initiative to Combat Transnational Organized Crime noted that Ukrainian refugees in Europe were at increasing risk of becoming victims of human trafficking. It was clarified that in 2022, Ukrainians more than once fell into the hands of criminals. Another negative trend has been the fetishization of refugees for sexual purposes due to their victim status.