The British security services, MI5 and MI6, are leading the hunt for the traffickers of 58 suspected illegal immigrants who died "a terrible death" in a hermetically sealed refrigerated lorry on the hottest day of the year.
As Downing Street confirmed the government's shock at this "appalling loss of human life", the Home Secretary, Mr Jack Straw, called for a common European policy to tackle "a profoundly evil trade" in people with an estimated global value of billions of pounds per year to its criminal organisers.
Customs staff who made the horrifying discovery in Dover at 11 p.m. on Sunday night were immediately released from their duties and offered psychiatric counselling.
While it was believed they were Chinese, investigators were awaiting the results of the first two post-mortems before confirming the nationalities of the deceased. Two Home Office pathologists were called in to begin the post-mortem process, which a Kent police spokesman predicted would be a lengthy affair. Ahead of that, however, Mr Graham Leese of the National Criminal Intelligence Service said the profile seemed to match a Chinese smuggling operation.
Would-be refugees fleeing the Chinese regime account for many of those who seek asylum in Britain. Chinese immigrants were the second-largest group applying to remain in the UK in April, the last month for which figures are available, comprising 455 of 5,890 applications received.
The immediate concern of the authorities is for the welfare of the two survivors, who were last night taken under guard from hospital to secure police accommodation. Their condition was said to be "not life-threatening" but, while they were making a physical recovery they were described as "too traumatised" to speak to police.
Police here and in Belgium and the Netherlands clearly expect that the survivors will be able provide vital information about the origins of the journey - presumably to a promised better life - which ended in death for 58 people in a shed in Dover port.
The driver of the lorry, a Dutch national, who was arrested immediately after the gruesome discovery, was being questioned at an undisclosed police station as officers considered a number of possible causes of death. It was not known if the driver knew of the human cargo he had carried on the 4 1/2-hour crossing from Zeebrugge.
A customs officer at Dover called in the emergency services after searching the lorry which had disembarked from the Euro- pean Pathway ferry. But the alert was first raised by the Belgium authorities, who notified Dover of concerns about the manifest and the fact that the ferry fees had been paid in cash.
As a major criminal investigation got under way the National Crime Squad (NCS) confirmed that the security services would target the traffickers in an operation headed by NCS and embracing the Immigration Service, Customs and the National Criminal Intelligence Service.
The director-general of NCS, Mr Roy Penrose, who visited Europol officials in The Hague just last Friday, also predicted increased co-operation between the British authorities and their European counterparts.
"The tragic incident at Dover further concentrates all our minds on the danger and misery caused by those who traffick in people for profit," he said. "Behind these events are some very evil and ruthless people, who often smuggle other commodities, too, including drugs, and are actively involved in international organised crime."
Reporting to MPs in the Commons yesterday, Mr Straw said the dead were the victims of serious organised criminals, and that their tragedy should serve as "stark warning" to others who might be tempted to place their fate in the hands of traffickers who had no regard for human life.
Experts believe that up to 10 "snakehead" gangs control the multi-million-pound trade smuggling people out of China, and Amnesty has said the most serious crackdown on dissent since Tiananmen Square has seen the numbers of would-be refugees fleeing to Britain soar.
Mr Nick Hardwick, chief executive of the Refugee Council, yesterday condemned "the callous traffickers who exploit human misery for financial gain".
But he continued: "The real crux is that it is virtually impossible for people fleeing persecution to enter Britain legally, and they are therefore forced to resort to such desperate measures in their search for sanctuary."