And how much of a cut does the Libyan Government get from the smugglers?
Let’s take the normal 100-man raft episode, and the going price of $1000 to $1500 a ‘spot’ on the raft. This gets you a seat, a jug of water, and you get dragged out about 10 to 15 miles off the coast. So each of these Chinese-made rafts are then dumped and sunk. You can figure one raft can potentially make you $120,000. The raft? I would imagine runs in the $1000 range, with fuel and time figured...you ought to make $115k for each trip.
The only Libyans I think....who take a cut on the deal are the Coast Guard folks who just look the other way. I don’t think the politicians are taking bribes that way. Instead, they are forcing the EU folks to just openly send money to them....to pretend to lessen or stop the smugglers.