German police investigate illegal workers in meatpacking industry

At the centre of the police investigation are two companies, IRC and Berkana, suspected of having brought workers to Germany illegally to place them in meatpacking jobs, the spokesman said, adding there were 10 main suspects with Russian or eastern European roots.

Police searched more than 40 homes and businesses in five German states early on Wednesday as part of an investigation into foreign workers being illegally brought to the country to be exploited in the meatpacking industry.

Police want to question more than 80 foreign workers, mostly from non-EU eastern European countries, including Ukraine and Belarus, a spokesman for federal police said. Germany's meatpacking sector has come under fire this year for the widespread use of sub-contracted migrant workers from eastern Europe, as cramped accommodation and poor oversight were suspected of accelerating coronavirus outbreaks.

In response, the German cabinet passed a new law in July compelling meatpackers to employ staff directly in industrial abattoirs rather than sub-contracting. At the centre of the police investigation are two companies, IRC and Berkana, suspected of having brought workers to Germany illegally to place them in meatpacking jobs, the spokesman said, adding there were 10 main suspects with Russian or eastern European roots. He did not name them.

Berkana had no immediate comment and Reuters was not immediately able to reach IRC. Some 820 police officers were involved in the raids that focused on the town of Weissenfels in the eastern German state of Saxony-Anhalt, where Germany's largest meatpacker and exporter Toennies has a factory.

A Toennies spokesman said so far there had been no raids at any of its offices or factories. He could not immediately say whether IRC and Berkana are subcontractors of Toennies. Labour Minister Hubertus Heil said in May he wanted the new rules to eliminate a system of "sub-sub-sub-contracting", where subcontractors often rely on other subcontractors to get staff.

The new law applies from January 2021 and bans sub-contracting in the industry's core business areas of animal slaughter and meat processing. Firms are only allowed to outsource work in non-core business areas, such as cleaning. It also provides stricter regulation of shared accommodation for employees and a minimum quota of annual on-the-spot inspections in companies.