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

Two Kurdish individuals consented to work covertly to reveal a organization behind illegal main street enterprises because the lawbreakers are negatively affecting the reputation of Kurds in the Britain, they say.

The two, who we are referring to as Saman and Ali, are Kurdish investigators who have both resided legally in the United Kingdom for a long time.

The team found that a Kurdish illegal enterprise was operating convenience stores, hair salons and vehicle cleaning services throughout the United Kingdom, and aimed to learn more about how it operated and who was participating.

Prepared with covert recording devices, Saman and Ali presented themselves as Kurdish-origin asylum seekers with no permission to work, looking to buy and run a mini-mart from which to sell contraband tobacco products and electronic cigarettes.

The investigators were successful to discover how simple it is for an individual in these circumstances to establish and run a business on the commercial area in plain sight. Those involved, we learned, pay Kurdish individuals who have UK citizenship to legally establish the businesses in their identities, assisting to mislead the officials.

Saman and Ali also were able to covertly record one of those at the heart of the network, who stated that he could erase government penalties of up to £60,000 imposed on those using illegal employees.

"I aimed to play a role in uncovering these illegal activities [...] to loudly proclaim that they do not characterize our community," states one reporter, a former asylum seeker personally. The reporter came to the United Kingdom illegally, having fled the Kurdish region - a region that covers the borders of multiple Middle Eastern countries but which is not officially recognized as a country - because his safety was at threat.

The journalists recognize that conflicts over unauthorized migration are high in the United Kingdom and say they have both been worried that the inquiry could worsen hostilities.

But the other reporter states that the illegal employment "negatively affects the entire Kurdish-origin population" and he believes compelled to "expose it [the criminal network] out into broad daylight".

Separately, the journalist says he was worried the publication could be exploited by the far-right.

He says this especially affected him when he realized that far-right activist Tommy Robinson's national unity march was happening in the capital on one of the Saturdays and Sundays he was operating covertly. Signs and banners could be observed at the protest, reading "we demand our country returned".

Saman and Ali have both been observing social media reaction to the exposé from within the Kurdish-origin community and explain it has sparked intense frustration for some. One Facebook post they found read: "In what way can we identify and find [the undercover reporters] to kill them like dogs!"

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

They have also seen allegations that they were informants for the UK authorities, and traitors to fellow Kurds. "We are not informants, and we have no intention of hurting the Kurdish population," Saman explains. "Our goal is to expose those who have damaged its reputation. Both journalists are proud of our Kurdish-origin heritage and profoundly concerned about the activities of such people."

Most of those applying for asylum say they are fleeing political oppression, according to an expert from the Refugee Workers Cultural Association, a organization that assists asylum seekers and asylum seekers in the United Kingdom.

This was the case for our undercover reporter Saman, who, when he first came to the UK, experienced challenges for years. He says he had to live on less than twenty pounds a per week while his refugee application was processed.

Refugee applicants now receive approximately forty-nine pounds a per week - or nine pounds ninety-five if they are in shelter which offers meals, according to official guidance.

"Honestly saying, this isn't sufficient to sustain a respectable life," explains the expert from the the organization.

Because refugee applicants are largely prevented from employment, he feels a significant number are susceptible to being taken advantage of and are effectively "obligated to labor in the black sector for as low as three pounds per hour".

A spokesperson for the authorities said: "The government make no apology for denying asylum seekers the right to be employed - doing so would generate an reason for individuals to migrate to the UK without authorization."

Refugee applications can take a long time to be decided with nearly a third taking more than one year, according to government data from the spring this year.

Saman says working without authorization in a vehicle cleaning service, hair salon or convenience store would have been very straightforward to achieve, but he told the team he would not have done that.

Nonetheless, he explains that those he interviewed working in unauthorized mini-marts during his research seemed "disoriented", notably those whose refugee application has been refused and who were in the appeals process.

"These individuals expended their entire funds to come to the UK, they had their refugee application refused and now they've lost everything."

Ali agrees that these people seemed hopeless.

"If [they] declare you're not allowed to be employed - but simultaneously [you]