ROME: Italian police said Monday they had arrested 13 suspected members of a smuggling ring transporting migrants from the Middle East and South Asia into Italy and onto France.

The suspects, from Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan, were picked up in several Italian cities including Bologna, Rome and Milan on Sunday, prosecutors in Catanzaro in the southern region of Calabria said.

They are accused of criminal association and money laundering.

Investigators had gathered evidence of a “criminal organisation rooted in Turkey and Iraq, with branches in Italy, France and Greece, dedicated to managing the sea transport of irregular migrants”, prosecutors said in a statement.

These migrants came from countries including Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Syria and Lebanon, and were brought onto the coasts of Calabria.