Pakistani man found dead in Tallinn apartment, eight illegal migrants detained with him

A 21-year-old man from Pakistan was pronounced dead on Saturday at an apartment on Tehnika Street in Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. Police also found eight other foreign nationals there who are staying in Estonia illegally and who said they had come from Latvia. The case is part of a wider flow of migrants moving through the Baltic states toward western and northern Europe.

How the call came in

At around 4 p.m. on Saturday, foreign nationals in the apartment called an ambulance for one of their companions. Paramedics who arrived confirmed the 21-year-old's death and notified police. Officers at the scene saw no external signs of violence on the body.

Inna Toater, operations manager at the North Prefecture of the Estonian police, said eight other foreign nationals were in the apartment and that checks showed they were in Estonia illegally. According to preliminary information, the men travelled from Latvia on Saturday. They themselves said that the night before, the vehicle carrying them had veered off the road in a traffic accident in Latvia. Police are now establishing how the men reached Estonia and under what circumstances one of them died.

Condition of the others

The health of the other foreign nationals was checked. Three men were taken to hospital for further examinations, and the remaining five were taken to a detention center. Preliminary information indicates that the eight are from Afghanistan, Morocco and Ethiopia.

The body of the 21-year-old was sent for an autopsy to establish the cause of death. Police are continuing to investigate the exact circumstances of the incident.

Wider context

This year, thousands of migrants have crossed the Belarusian-Latvian border into the European Union without proper documentation, in what officials describe as a "hybrid attack" orchestrated by the regime in Minsk. The migrants, mostly from Africa and the Middle East, continue on to other countries in western or northern Europe, using Estonia as a transit country. More than 400 people have been caught in Estonia this year, after Poland and Germany boosted security checks on their borders and smugglers changed their routes. Apprehended migrants are usually returned to Latvia under EU rules.