Survivor claims the crime was carried out by “Pakistan mafia” amid dispute over pay.
Italian police have arrested two Pakistani nationals over the murder of four migrant farm labourers killed after being burned alive inside a locked minivan at a fuel station in the southern Calabria region.
The four victims were three Afghan nationals and one Pakistani national, according to Italian media reports. Investigators are treating the case as multiple aggravated murder.
The incident
The bodies were discovered on Monday 1 June inside a Fiat Ulisse minivan parked at a service station in the outskirts of Amendolara in the Cosenza province.
Firefighters were called to the scene at around 13.00, but upon extinguishing the blaze found four badly burned corpses inside the vehicle.
CCTV evidence and arrests
Investigators obtained footage from the petrol station’s surveillance cameras, which proved central to the case.
The footage shows two individuals – subsequently identified as the suspects – arriving at the scene in the same minivan as the victims.
A dispute then appears to break out. One suspect is seen physically holding a door closed from the outside to prevent those inside from escaping, while the other is recorded pouring what investigators believe to be a flammable liquid through the rear hatch before the vehicle ignites. Both men then flee the scene.
The two Pakistani suspects were located that same evening in the nearby town of Villapiana and taken to the Cosenza police heaquarters where they were detained on charges of multiple aggravated murder.
Survivor’s account
A fifth occupant of the vehicle, a 35-year-old Afghan national, survived the attack. He had been living with the victims in Villapiana and was working as a seasonal labourer in the local strawberry harvest.
Speaking exclusively to TGR Calabria, the man – who displayed burns to multiple parts of his body – said he managed to escape by forcing his way out through trunk of the vehicle.
He alleged that the two arrested men were labour intermediaries, or caporali, who had demanded payment for transport. When the workers refused to pay, he said, the men poured petrol into the car and set it alight.
He further alleged that the labourers had not been paid wages for their farm work, though they were provided with food and housing. “They gave us food. They gave us a house. But not money,” he told journalists.
He also claimed that the suspects had previously threatened the workers with weapons to compel them to work, and referred to the existence of what he called a “Pakistani mafia” operating in the area.
Background
The killings took place in the Sibaritide plain, an intensively farmed area in the province of Cosenza that is heavily dependent on migrant labour for seasonal harvests, including citrus fruits, olives and strawberries.
The region has long been associated with the caporalato system – the illegal recruitment and exploitation of agricultural day labourers, often migrants, by gang-masters who extract fees for transport, housing and work placement.
The case has prompted strong reactions in Italy, with trade union CGIL Calabria warning that the killings could reflect a violent feud between rival caporali networks. A press conference was scheduled for Wednesday at which prosecutors were expected to provide a fuller account of events.
The investigation is ongoing.
