Nearly 8,000 arrested in alien smuggling scheme

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Nearly 8,000 emigrants who paid criminal operators to smuggle them into the United States from Latin America or the Caribbean have been arrested over the past two weeks, U.S. immigration officials said Wednesday.

Top immigration officials credited unprecedented cooperation from a dozen Latin American and Caribbean countries for interdicting the emigrants and arresting 75 smugglers in what is termed the largest anti-alien smuggling operation ever conducted in the hemisphere.

"We're talking here today about a great partnership in the Americas in going after people who try to profit from human misery and desperation," said Kevin Rooney, acting commissioner for the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service.

The majority of emigrants were from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala. Authorities intercepted citizens of 39 different countries during the 16-day operation.

More than 5,000 of the arrests took place in Mexico in what the INS called Operation Crossroads International.

Officials acknowledged the operation would not end the lucrative human smuggling trade.

"Neither INS nor any of the international partners are satisfied with merely disrupting smuggling operations. We want to dismantle them," Rooney said.

'Global problems, global solutions'

U.S. officials also announced the results of a smaller anti-smuggling operation involving the governments of Sri Lanka, India, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and the Netherlands. In the three-week coordinated crackdown, 415 emigrants were arrested following intense screening at major international airports.

Because the worldwide demand for illegal entry into the United States is so high, smugglers are increasing prices.

Officials say emigrants from Central America pay smugglers on average from $3,000 to $4,000 apiece. By contrast, Chinese citizens attempting to be smuggled into the United States pay the highest fees to criminal rings, often in the range of $50,000 to $60,000 each.

"These activities affect not only the countries migrants are destined for, but also those they come from and transit through," said Michael Pearson, executive associate commissioner of field operations for the INS.

"These are global problems that demand a global solution," he said.

Hipolito Acosta, head of the INS office in Mexico City, which oversaw the Latin American operation, said authorities are trying to make prospective emigrants aware of the risks they face from the moment they leave their homes until they get to the United States.

"Five individuals were found in a trailer that was being transported from southern Mexico to the United States, and they were basically cooked alive by the heat inside the trailer," Acosta said. "In addition, we saw recent incidents of Haitians who drowned."

U.S. citizens among those arrested

The INS released a videotape showing hundreds of people who had been arrested in Guatemala where many were processed and returned to their home countries.

Of the nearly 8,000 arrested in Latin America and the Caribbean, about 5,500 were repatriated to their homes from the transit countries in which they were stopped.

Seven U.S. citizens were arrested for immigration law violations in Latin America during the operation.

The INS said the alleged smugglers would be prosecuted in the countries in which they were arrested. He expressed confidence that in such a high-profile case the cooperating governments would be able to convict them.

CNN Producer Terry Frieden contributed to this report.