The Reasons Our Team Went Covert to Reveal Crime in the Kurdish-origin Community

Two Kurdish men decided to operate secretly to reveal a network behind unlawful commercial businesses because the wrongdoers are negatively affecting the image of Kurdish people in the UK, they explain.

The pair, who we are calling Ali and Saman, are Kurdish investigators who have both lived lawfully in the United Kingdom for years.

Investigators found that a Kurdish criminal operation was managing small shops, hair salons and vehicle cleaning services across Britain, and aimed to discover more about how it functioned and who was participating.

Prepared with secret cameras, Ali and Saman presented themselves as Kurdish refugee applicants with no permission to work, attempting to buy and run a mini-mart from which to trade unlawful tobacco products and vapes.

They were able to uncover how simple it is for an individual in these situations to set up and manage a business on the High Street in public view. The individuals involved, we found, compensate Kurds who have UK residency to register the businesses in their identities, enabling to mislead the officials.

Saman and Ali also managed to covertly record one of those at the centre of the network, who claimed that he could erase official penalties of up to sixty thousand pounds encountered those employing unauthorized laborers.

"Personally sought to participate in exposing these illegal practices [...] to say that they don't speak for our community," explains one reporter, a ex- asylum seeker himself. The reporter came to the UK illegally, having fled Kurdistan - a region that spans the boundaries of multiple Middle Eastern countries but which is not internationally recognised as a country - because his safety was at risk.

The investigators acknowledge that disagreements over illegal immigration are elevated in the UK and state they have both been anxious that the probe could intensify tensions.

But the other reporter states that the unauthorized working "negatively affects the whole Kurdish-origin population" and he considers obligated to "expose it [the criminal network] out into the open".

Additionally, Ali says he was worried the publication could be seized upon by the far-right.

He says this particularly struck him when he realized that radical right campaigner a prominent activist's national unity protest was happening in the capital on one of the weekends he was operating covertly. Placards and flags could be spotted at the protest, reading "we want our nation back".

Both journalists have both been monitoring social media feedback to the exposé from within the Kurdish population and report it has caused significant outrage for some. One Facebook comment they observed read: "How can we identify and find [the undercover reporters] to attack them like animals!"

Another demanded their families in the Kurdish region to be harmed.

They have also encountered allegations that they were informants for the UK government, and traitors to fellow Kurdish people. "Both of us are not informants, and we have no desire of hurting the Kurdish-origin population," one reporter states. "Our aim is to reveal those who have harmed its image. Both journalists are honored of our Kurdish identity and profoundly worried about the behavior of such individuals."

Most of those applying for asylum claim they are fleeing politically motivated discrimination, according to an expert from the Refugee Workers Cultural Association, a organization that assists refugees and asylum seekers in the UK.

This was the scenario for our undercover reporter Saman, who, when he first came to the UK, faced difficulties 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 approximately £49 a per week - or nine pounds ninety-five if they are in accommodation which offers food, according to Home Office policies.

"Practically saying, this isn't enough to maintain a respectable lifestyle," explains Mr Avicil from the the organization.

Because asylum seekers are largely prohibited from employment, he thinks a significant number are open to being manipulated and are effectively "obligated to work in the black sector for as low as £3 per hourly rate".

A representative for the Home Office said: "The government make no apology for denying asylum seekers the permission to be employed - granting this would establish an incentive for individuals to travel to the United Kingdom illegally."

Asylum cases can take years to be decided with approximately a one-third taking more than one year, according to official data from the end of March this year.

Saman explains being employed illegally in a vehicle cleaning service, barbershop or convenience store would have been extremely straightforward to achieve, but he explained to the team he would not have participated in that.

Nevertheless, he states that those he met laboring in unauthorized convenience stores during his work seemed "lost", especially those whose refugee application has been denied and who were in the appeal stage.

"They spent their entire savings to migrate to the UK, they had their refugee application denied and now they've lost their entire investment."

The other reporter agrees that these individuals seemed in dire straits.

"When [they] state you're forbidden to be employed - but additionally [you]