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Suspects charged with masterminding illegal migration, slave labor in Moscow.

Russian Interior Ministry has charged six Vietnamese citizens with using slave labor of their compatriots, organizing a criminal group and illegal migration in Moscow

Photo ITAR-TASS/ Igor Kubedinov

Photo ITAR-TASS/ Igor Kubedinov

MOSCOW, August 22 (Itar-Tass) - The Russian Interior Ministry has charged six Vietnamese citizens with using slave labor of their compatriots, organizing a criminal group and illegal migration in Moscow.

"Preliminary investigation found that these persons had set up a consolidated group to use slave labor of Vietnamese citizens and persons from other states staying in Russia illegally," the Ministry's main investigation department told Itar-Tass on Thursday.

The suspects purchased and installed sewing equipment, provided workshops, living quarters and minimal and insufficient sanitary norms and labor conditions for the compatriots and foreigners they had forced into working for them. "The personnel's passports were taken away which lost them the possibility to go back to their native country, realize their civil rights in Russia, or decline to work for the employers," police said.

All the suspects are in custody.

Moscow police began checks of city areas frequented by migrants after the conflict on the Matveyevsky market, when a suspect's relative seriously injured a police officer. During one such raids in Irtyshsky Proyezd, police detained 1,200 Vietnamese and found 20 illegal workshops. In Sovetskaya Street, more workshops were found, with police detaining 200 citizens from a number of foreign states, who were staying in Russia illegally.

Among the detainees were citizens of Egypt, Morocco, Syria, Uzbekistan and Azerbaijan. Part of the illegal aliens' passports were apparently forged. More than 900 Moscow police were involved in the raid.

After the raid, the Moscow authorities set up a tent camp in Irtyshsky Proyezd for 1,000 illegal aliens. The move caused a public stir. Part of the Vietnamese were deported, and the tent camp was closed. Those who remained in Russia were transferred to the temporary center in the village of Severny.

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