Why We Chose to Go Undercover to Expose Criminal Activity in the Kurdish Community

A pair of Kurdish individuals agreed to work covertly to reveal a network behind illegal main street businesses because the criminals are negatively affecting the reputation of Kurdish people in the UK, they say.

The pair, who we are calling Saman and Ali, are Kurdish-origin investigators who have both lived lawfully in the UK for a long time.

The team found that a Kurdish crime network was running mini-marts, hair salons and car washes the length of the UK, and sought to find out more about how it operated and who was taking part.

Armed with covert cameras, Saman and Ali posed as Kurdish refugee applicants with no right to work, seeking to buy and operate a convenience store from which to sell illegal cigarettes and electronic cigarettes.

The investigators were successful to discover how easy it is for someone in these situations to establish and operate a enterprise on the High Street in public view. The individuals involved, we learned, compensate Kurds who have British citizenship to legally establish the businesses in their identities, assisting to deceive the government agencies.

Ali and Saman also managed to discreetly document one of those at the centre of the organization, who claimed that he could erase government sanctions of up to £60,000 imposed on those employing unauthorized laborers.

"Personally sought to play a role in uncovering these illegal activities [...] to declare that they don't characterize our community," says Saman, a ex- refugee applicant himself. The reporter entered the country without authorization, having fled Kurdistan - a area that spans the boundaries of multiple Middle Eastern countries but which is not officially recognized as a country - because his life was at danger.

The journalists acknowledge that conflicts over unauthorized immigration are significant in the United Kingdom and explain they have both been concerned that the inquiry could intensify hostilities.

But Ali states that the illegal working "harms the entire Kurdish-origin community" and he believes driven to "bring it [the criminal network] out into the open".

Furthermore, Ali explains he was concerned the reporting could be seized upon by the far-right.

He states this particularly impressed him when he realized that far-right activist Tommy Robinson's Unite the Kingdom protest was occurring in the capital on one of the weekends he was working covertly. Placards and banners could be spotted at the gathering, displaying "we demand our country back".

Saman and Ali have both been monitoring social media feedback to the exposé from within the Kurdish population and report it has generated strong frustration for some. One social media comment they found stated: "How can we find and locate [the undercover reporters] to kill them like animals!"

A different called for their families in the Kurdish region to be harmed.

They have also encountered accusations that they were spies for the British authorities, and traitors to fellow Kurds. "Both of us are not spies, and we have no aim of damaging the Kurdish population," Saman says. "Our goal is to uncover those who have damaged its reputation. We are proud of our Kurdish identity and extremely troubled about the behavior of such individuals."

The majority of those applying for refugee status state they are escaping political discrimination, according to an expert from the a refugee support organization, a organization that helps asylum seekers and refugee applicants in the United Kingdom.

This was the case for our undercover journalist one investigator, who, when he initially arrived to the United Kingdom, experienced challenges for years. He explains he had to survive on under £20 a week while his refugee application was processed.

Refugee applicants now get approximately £49 a week - or £9.95 if they are in accommodation which offers food, according to official policies.

"Practically stating, this isn't adequate to maintain a acceptable lifestyle," states the expert from the the organization.

Because asylum seekers are generally restricted from working, he feels numerous are vulnerable to being manipulated and are effectively "compelled to labor in the unofficial market for as little as £3 per hourly rate".

A official for the authorities said: "We make no apology for refusing to grant refugee applicants the right to work - granting this would generate an motivation for people to migrate to the UK without authorization."

Refugee cases can require a long time to be processed with approximately a one-third taking more than a year, according to government data from the end of March this year.

The reporter states working without authorization in a car wash, barbershop or convenience store would have been extremely easy to accomplish, but he explained to the team he would never have participated in that.

Nevertheless, he explains that those he interviewed laboring in unauthorized mini-marts during his research seemed "disoriented", especially those whose asylum claim has been rejected and who were in the appeal stage.

"These individuals expended all of their savings to come to the United Kingdom, they had their refugee application denied and now they've forfeited all they had."

Ali acknowledges that these people seemed in dire straits.

"When [they] state you're not allowed to work - but simultaneously [you]