The 39 migrants who were discovered dead in a refrigerated truck container at Waterglade Industrial Park in Grays, Essex, in the early hours of Wednesday morning were Chinese nationals, police have confirmed.

"...eight of the deceased are women and 31 are men and all are believed to be Chinese nationals," the police confirmed.

They have launched an inquiry and are continuing to question the driver of the lorry, Mo Robinson, 25, who was arrested on suspicion of murder.

The police had initially stated that the vehicle had entered the UK via Holyhead in north Wales, but have since confirmed that the trailer had arrived separately into Purfleet, Essex, on the River Thames, from Zeebrugge in Belgium.

Authorities have revealed that the tractor unit - the front part of the truck that hauls the container - came from Northern Ireland and had picked up the trailer at Purfleet. The lorry and trailer left the port at Purfleet shortly after 01:05.

Three properties in Northern Ireland have been raided and the National Crime Agency is working to establish if "organised crime groups" were involved. [...]

Councillor Paul Berry said the village of Laurelvale in County Armagh, where the Robinson family live, was in "complete shock".

He said he had been in contact with Mr Robinson's father, who had learned of his son's arrest on Wednesday through social media.

"The local community is hoping that he [Mo Robinson] has been caught up innocently in this matter but that's in the hands of Essex Police, and we will leave it in their professional hands to try to catch the perpetrators of this," he said.

The lorry has been moved to a secure site at Tilbury Docks and police have begun the process of moving the bodies to a mortuary at Broomfield Hospital in Chelmsford. They will be taken by private ambulance under police escort so that post-mortem examinations can take place, with the force expecting all the bodies to have been moved by the weekend.

Essex Police said it was the largest murder investigation in the force's history and the victims were all "believed to be Chinese nationals."

It said formal identification of the 39 people, one of whom is a young adult woman, "could be a lengthy process".

China's ambassador to the UK Liu Xiaoming tweeted that the embassy had read the reports of the deaths "with heavy hearts" and was in close contact with British police.

[...] A spokesman for the Bulgarian foreign affairs ministry said the truck was registered in the country under the name of a company owned by an Irish citizen.

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