A Nigerian criminal gang called the Black Axe is spreading its tentacles in Uppsala and other Swedish cities, local reports have said. A report in RT says the gang of drug-traffickers and people-smugglers are notorious for their brutality. And the stranger part of the report is that the gangsters are using black magic to harvest their victims.
There were reports earlier this month that 15 people were charged with "particularly serious drug offenses" after they were apprehended in connection with the death cult mafia. Though Uppsala is the centre of the gang, other cities like Gothenburg and Stockholm have also been penetrated by them, reports said. The gang is reportedly using juju, a Nigerian version of the voodoo to lure associates.
Besides running drug trafficking networks and extortions and blackmail, the gang is also luring women into prostitution with the help of voodoo, the report said. "They are holding women hostage and are tricking them through the use of voodoo into believing that it will end up badly for them if they quit", Uppsala police spokesman Jale Poljarevius told national broadcaster SVT.
A huge contingent of Nigerian immigrants is behind the rise of this deadly gang, Sputnik International said in a report. As many as 17,000 young Nigerian women have been brought to Europe by this network in recent years, the report said, adding that many of these women are engaged in criminal activities.
"I would say it is one of the world's most effective crime syndicates", Stockholm police spokesman Lennart Karlsson told Swedish Radio, the report added.
The Black Axe mafia took origins in Nigeria in the 1980s but their spread in Europe followed the 2015 migrant crisis, the report said. "The organization is estimated to have sold drugs worth a total of 112 million Swedish Krona ($11.51 million) ... amounting to approximately 42 kilograms of cocaine, 50 kilograms of heroin and 40 kilograms of heroin/cocaine mix," a report in Sweden's Expressen newspaper said.
The RT report says that the gang is using a Stockholm mosque to recruit operatives from the migrants who throng there. "People ... [are] told to come there and get contacts to get a job. The Black Axe members hang out outside and [recruit] them," local police spokesman Lennart Karlsson told the Ekot newspaper, according to RT.
