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

Two Kurdish men decided to operate secretly to uncover a organization behind unlawful commercial enterprises because the lawbreakers are causing harm the image of Kurds in the Britain, they explain.

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

The team discovered that a Kurdish criminal operation was running mini-marts, hair salons and vehicle cleaning services throughout the UK, and aimed to find out more about how it worked and who was participating.

Equipped with hidden cameras, Ali and Saman presented themselves as Kurdish refugee applicants with no authorization to be employed, looking to purchase and operate a convenience store from which to distribute contraband cigarettes and electronic cigarettes.

The investigators were successful to uncover how easy it is for someone in these conditions to start and run a commercial operation on the High Street in full view. The individuals involved, we discovered, pay Kurdish individuals who have British citizenship to register the businesses in their identities, helping to deceive the government agencies.

Ali and Saman also managed to discreetly film one of those at the centre of the operation, who stated that he could remove government fines of up to sixty thousand pounds imposed on those employing unauthorized employees.

"Personally sought to participate in exposing these illegal operations [...] to say that they do not represent us," explains one reporter, a ex- refugee applicant personally. Saman entered the country illegally, having escaped from the Kurdish region - a area that straddles the boundaries of Iraq, Iran, Turkey and Syria but which is not officially recognized as a nation - because his life was at risk.

The reporters admit that disagreements over illegal migration are significant in the UK and explain they have both been concerned that the inquiry could inflame hostilities.

But Ali says that the unauthorized employment "harms the whole Kurdish population" and he feels driven to "reveal it [the criminal network] out into the open".

Furthermore, the journalist mentions he was anxious the coverage could be exploited by the far-right.

He says this particularly struck him when he discovered that extreme right campaigner a prominent activist's Unite the Kingdom protest was taking place in London on one of the Saturdays and Sundays he was operating covertly. Placards and flags could be seen at the gathering, displaying "we want our country returned".

The reporters have both been tracking social media response to the investigation from within the Kurdish-origin population and say it has sparked intense outrage for some. One Facebook post they spotted stated: "How can we locate and find [the undercover reporters] to harm them like animals!"

One more urged their relatives in Kurdistan to be harmed.

They have also read claims 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 harming the Kurdish-origin community," Saman says. "Our objective is to expose those who have damaged its standing. Both journalists are proud of our Kurdish-origin identity and extremely worried about the activities of such people."

The majority of those seeking asylum claim they are escaping politically motivated discrimination, according to Ibrahim Avicil from the Refugee Workers Cultural Association, a organization that assists refugees and refugee applicants in the UK.

This was the scenario for our covert journalist Saman, who, when he first came to the UK, struggled for many years. He explains he had to live on less than £20 a week while his refugee application was processed.

Asylum seekers now receive about forty-nine pounds a per week - or £9.95 if they are in accommodation which includes food, according to official regulations.

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

Because asylum seekers are generally restricted from employment, he thinks many are susceptible to being exploited and are practically "compelled to work in the unofficial market for as low as three pounds per hour".

A official for the Home Office said: "The government are unapologetic for denying refugee applicants the permission to work - doing so would create an incentive for people to travel to the United Kingdom without authorization."

Asylum applications can take multiple years to be resolved with nearly a 33% taking more than a year, according to official statistics from the end of March this year.

Saman explains being employed illegally in a car wash, barbershop or convenience store would have been quite straightforward to achieve, but he explained to us he would never have engaged in that.

Nevertheless, he states that those he met laboring in illegal mini-marts during his investigation seemed "lost", especially those whose asylum claim has been rejected and who were in the appeal stage.

"They spent their entire money to come to the UK, they had their refugee application denied and now they've forfeited all they had."

Ali acknowledges that these individuals seemed hopeless.

"If [they] say you're not allowed to work - but simultaneously [you]