The Reasons Our Team Went Undercover to Expose Crime in the Kurdish Community

A pair of Kurdish men consented to work covertly to reveal a organization behind illegal High Street enterprises because the criminals are damaging the reputation of Kurds in the Britain, they state.

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

Investigators uncovered that a Kurdish criminal operation was running convenience stores, hair salons and vehicle cleaning services the length of the United Kingdom, and aimed to discover more about how it operated and who was involved.

Equipped with covert recording devices, Ali and Saman posed as Kurdish refugee applicants with no authorization to work, looking to acquire and manage a small shop from which to distribute illegal tobacco products and vapes.

They were successful to uncover how straightforward it is for a person in these conditions to start and manage a enterprise on the High Street in full view. Those participating, we discovered, compensate Kurds who have British citizenship to register the enterprises in their names, helping to deceive the authorities.

Ali and Saman also were able to secretly document one of those at the centre of the organization, who stated that he could erase official penalties of up to £60,000 imposed on those hiring unauthorized employees.

"I sought to participate in uncovering these illegal operations [...] to declare that they don't represent us," explains Saman, a ex- refugee applicant himself. Saman came to the United Kingdom illegally, having escaped from Kurdistan - a region 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 investigators admit that disagreements over unauthorized immigration are high in the UK and explain they have both been anxious that the inquiry could intensify conflicts.

But the other reporter states that the unauthorized labor "negatively affects the entire Kurdish population" and he believes obligated to "expose it [the criminal network] out into public view".

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

He says this particularly struck him when he realized that radical right activist Tommy Robinson's Unite the Kingdom protest was happening in London on one of the weekends he was working undercover. Signs and banners could be observed at the rally, reading "we demand our country back".

Both journalists have both been tracking online reaction to the exposé from inside the Kurdish community and report it has generated significant frustration for certain individuals. One Facebook message they found said: "In what way can we find and track [the undercover reporters] to harm them like animals!"

One more urged their families in the Kurdish region to be slaughtered.

They have also read allegations that they were spies for the UK authorities, and traitors to other Kurds. "We are not informants, and we have no intention of hurting the Kurdish-origin community," Saman states. "Our goal is to reveal those who have damaged its reputation. Both journalists are honored of our Kurdish-origin identity and profoundly worried about the actions of such people."

The majority of those seeking asylum state they are escaping politically motivated oppression, according to Ibrahim Avicil from the Refugee Workers Cultural Association, a non-profit that helps refugees and asylum seekers in the United Kingdom.

This was the case for our undercover reporter Saman, who, when he first came to the United Kingdom, faced difficulties for many years. He says he had to survive on less than twenty pounds a week while his asylum claim was reviewed.

Asylum seekers now receive about £49 a week - or nine pounds ninety-five if they are in shelter which offers meals, according to Home Office policies.

"Honestly stating, this isn't adequate to maintain a respectable existence," says the expert from the RWCA.

Because asylum seekers are mostly restricted from working, he thinks many are open to being taken advantage of and are essentially "forced to work in the black market for as low as three pounds per hourly rate".

A spokesperson for the Home Office said: "The government make no apology for not granting asylum seekers the authorization to be employed - doing so would create an motivation for individuals to come to the United Kingdom without authorization."

Refugee applications can require multiple years to be decided with nearly a 33% requiring over a year, according to government data from the late March this year.

The reporter states working without authorization in a vehicle cleaning service, hair salon or convenience store would have been quite straightforward to do, but he explained to the team he would never have engaged in that.

However, he explains that those he encountered working in unauthorized mini-marts during his work seemed "disoriented", particularly those whose asylum claim has been refused and who were in the appeal stage.

"These individuals used all their money to migrate to the UK, they had their asylum rejected and now they've sacrificed all they had."

Ali concurs that these individuals seemed in dire straits.

"When [they] say you're not allowed to be employed - but simultaneously [you]