Why Our Team Went Undercover to Expose Criminal Activity in the Kurdish Community

Two Kurdish individuals decided to operate secretly to uncover a network behind unlawful High Street enterprises because the lawbreakers are negatively affecting the standing of Kurdish people in the United Kingdom, they explain.

The two, who we are calling Saman and Ali, are Kurdish-origin journalists who have both lived lawfully in the United Kingdom for a long time.

The team discovered that a Kurdish-linked crime network was operating mini-marts, hair salons and car washes the length of Britain, and sought to learn more about how it functioned and who was taking part.

Equipped with hidden recording devices, Saman and Ali posed as Kurdish-origin refugee applicants with no right to be employed, attempting to purchase and run a small shop from which to sell illegal tobacco products and vapes.

They were able to reveal how easy it is for an individual in these circumstances to establish and run a business on the commercial area in full view. The individuals participating, we discovered, pay Kurdish individuals who have UK citizenship to register the operations in their names, assisting to fool the government agencies.

Ali and Saman also managed to covertly document one of those at the centre of the organization, who asserted that he could remove government sanctions of up to £60,000 encountered those hiring illegal workers.

"I aimed to play a role in uncovering these illegal operations [...] to say that they don't characterize us," explains one reporter, a former asylum seeker himself. Saman came to the United Kingdom illegally, having fled the Kurdish region - a area that covers the borders of Iraq, Iran, Turkey and Syria but which is not internationally recognised as a state - because his well-being was at danger.

The reporters recognize that conflicts over illegal migration are elevated in the United Kingdom and state they have both been worried that the investigation could intensify conflicts.

But the other reporter states that the illegal employment "damages the entire Kurdish population" and he considers obligated to "expose it [the criminal network] out into the open".

Furthermore, the journalist mentions he was anxious the reporting could be used by the extreme right.

He explains this notably impressed him when he realized that far-right campaigner a prominent activist's Unite the Kingdom rally was taking place in the capital on one of the Saturdays and Sundays he was working undercover. Banners and banners could be seen at the protest, displaying "we demand our nation returned".

Both journalists have both been observing social media feedback to the investigation from inside the Kurdish-origin population and report it has generated intense anger for certain individuals. One social media comment they found said: "In what way can we identify and find [the undercover reporters] to kill them like animals!"

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

They have also encountered claims that they were agents for the UK authorities, and traitors to fellow Kurds. "Both of us are not informants, and we have no intention of harming the Kurdish population," one reporter states. "Our objective is to expose those who have damaged its standing. Both journalists are honored of our Kurdish-origin heritage and profoundly worried about the behavior of such individuals."

Most of those seeking refugee status state they are escaping politically motivated oppression, according to an expert from the a refugee support organization, a organization that supports asylum seekers and refugee applicants in the United Kingdom.

This was the scenario for our undercover journalist one investigator, who, when he initially arrived to the United Kingdom, struggled for many years. He states he had to live on under twenty pounds a week while his refugee application was processed.

Asylum seekers now receive about forty-nine pounds a week - or nine pounds ninety-five if they are in housing which offers food, according to official policies.

"Honestly saying, this isn't adequate to support a respectable existence," says Mr Avicil from the the organization.

Because refugee applicants are mostly prevented from working, he feels many are susceptible to being manipulated and are effectively "forced to work in the illegal sector for as little as £3 per hourly rate".

A representative for the authorities stated: "The government do not apologize for refusing to grant asylum seekers the authorization to be employed - granting this would generate an reason for individuals to come to the United Kingdom illegally."

Refugee cases can require multiple years to be processed with almost a 33% requiring more than one year, according to official figures from the spring this year.

The reporter explains working illegally in a car wash, barbershop or mini-mart would have been quite easy to do, but he told us he would never have engaged in that.

Nevertheless, he says that those he met laboring in illegal convenience stores during his investigation seemed "lost", particularly those whose refugee application has been rejected and who were in the appeals process.

"These individuals used all their funds to migrate to the United Kingdom, they had their asylum rejected and now they've sacrificed their entire investment."

The other reporter concurs that these individuals seemed desperate.

"If [they] state you're not allowed to be employed - but also [you]