BELGRADE, Serbia, May 22 (UPI) -- Serbian police said they arrested 18 people on suspicion of stealing and smuggling cars from Europe to the Middle East.

A Serbian special police unit for organized crime arrested 11 people in Belgrade and seven others in six towns across Serbia, Belgrade's B92 radio reported Tuesday.

Serbian police cooperated with police in Austria, Germany and France in efforts to break the Serbian ring that included an Iraqi and a Syrian.

The organized group was reportedly stealing luxury cars such as Porsche Cayenne, Audi and BMW models in Western Europe and transferring them across Serbia, Bulgaria and Turkey to Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and other countries in the Middle East.

The group was also trafficking expensive buses and trucks, police said.

Investigators said the group's income from smuggling cars is estimated at several million dollars.