The Reasons Our Team Chose to Go Covert to Uncover Criminal Activity in the Kurdish Community

Two Kurdish-background individuals agreed to operate secretly to expose a organization behind illegal High Street enterprises because the criminals are causing harm the image of Kurds in the UK, they say.

The pair, who we are referring to as Saman and Ali, are Kurdish reporters who have both resided lawfully in the UK for many years.

Investigators uncovered that a Kurdish-linked crime network was operating small shops, hair salons and car washes the length of the United Kingdom, and sought to learn more about how it operated and who was participating.

Armed with secret recording devices, Ali and Saman posed as Kurdish-origin asylum seekers with no permission to be employed, seeking to acquire and run a small shop from which to sell unlawful tobacco products and electronic cigarettes.

The investigators were able to reveal how easy it is for someone in these conditions to start and operate a commercial operation on the main street in plain sight. The individuals involved, we learned, pay Kurds who have UK residency to register the operations in their identities, enabling to fool the officials.

Ali and Saman also managed to discreetly document one of those at the centre of the organization, who asserted that he could erase government sanctions of up to sixty thousand pounds faced those using illegal workers.

"I aimed to participate in exposing these illegal operations [...] to declare that they do not characterize our community," explains one reporter, a ex- refugee applicant personally. The reporter entered the United Kingdom without authorization, having escaped from the Kurdish region - a area that straddles the borders of Iraq, Iran, Turkey and Syria but which is not officially recognized as a state - because his safety was at risk.

The investigators recognize that disagreements over illegal migration are high in the UK and state they have both been anxious that the inquiry could worsen hostilities.

But Ali explains that the unauthorized working "negatively affects the entire Kurdish community" and he believes compelled to "bring it [the criminal network] out into the open".

Furthermore, the journalist says he was concerned the reporting could be seized upon by the extreme right.

He explains this particularly impressed him when he realized that extreme right campaigner a prominent activist's national unity march was occurring in the capital on one of the weekends he was operating covertly. Banners and flags could be observed at the protest, displaying "we want our nation returned".

Saman and Ali have both been tracking social media response to the exposé from within the Kurdish-origin community and explain it has sparked intense outrage for some. One Facebook comment they spotted read: "How can we identify and find [the undercover reporters] to harm them like dogs!"

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

They have also encountered allegations that they were agents for the UK government, and betrayers to fellow Kurdish people. "We are not informants, and we have no intention of damaging the Kurdish-origin community," Saman explains. "Our goal is to expose those who have damaged its reputation. Both journalists are honored of our Kurdish identity and deeply worried about the actions of such people."

The majority of those applying for asylum state they are fleeing political persecution, according to an expert from the a charitable organization, a charity that assists refugees and asylum seekers in the United Kingdom.

This was the situation for our covert journalist one investigator, who, when he initially arrived to the UK, struggled for years. He states he had to live on under £20 a per week while his refugee application was reviewed.

Refugee applicants now are provided about forty-nine pounds a per week - or £9.95 if they are in shelter which offers food, according to government regulations.

"Realistically speaking, this is not enough to maintain a respectable lifestyle," explains the expert from the the organization.

Because asylum seekers are generally restricted from employment, he believes numerous are vulnerable to being manipulated and are practically "obligated to labor in the illegal sector for as little as £3 per hour".

A spokesperson for the Home Office stated: "The government do not apologize for not granting refugee applicants the authorization to work - granting this would generate an reason for individuals to migrate to the UK without authorization."

Asylum cases can take a long time to be resolved with approximately a 33% requiring over a year, according to government figures from the spring this year.

The reporter states working without authorization in a car wash, barbershop or convenience store would have been very easy to do, but he informed the team he would never have engaged in that.

Nevertheless, he explains that those he encountered working in illegal mini-marts during his research seemed "confused", particularly those whose refugee application has been refused and who were in the appeals process.

"They spent their entire funds to migrate to the United Kingdom, they had their refugee application refused and now they've lost all they had."

Ali concurs that these individuals seemed desperate.

"When [they] state you're prohibited to work - but additionally [you]