People Smugglers Should Face Same Fate as Suspected Terrorists, Immigration Court Rules

A man being detained as part of Operation Punjum in an undated file photo. Dozens of arrests have been made in what police believe is the biggest international operation to crack down on criminal gangs suspected of people-smuggling across the Channel. A slew of raids took place in the UK, Germany, France, and the Netherlands, as part of a joint operation coordinated by Europol with Eurojust, the European Union's criminal justice cooperation agency. National Crime Agency

People smugglers should be treated the same as terror suspects, Britain’s highest immigration court has ruled.

The Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC) made the judgement after rejecting an appeal brought forward by two suspected ringleaders of a human trafficking network over a decision to revoke their citizenship.

The Afghanistan nationals had their British citizen status removed by the home secretary after the National Crime Agency (NCA) said they were involved in smuggling “vulnerable” adults and children into the UK for sexual and modern slavery.

Another Afghan accused of being part of the same gang—but who did not have citizenship—had an appeal against a decision to permanently exclude him from the UK.

Lawyers acting on behalf of the men argued that previous guidance by the Supreme Court in the case of jihadi bride Shamima Begum—whose citizenship was revoked in 2019—should not apply to their cases, as national security was not a factor.

However, SIAC judges disagreed, stating that the home secretary’s decision to deprive citizenship on the basis it was “conducive to the public good” is not limited to cases involving national security.

Smuggling Plot

The ruling was made after both an open and closed court hearing, where some of a NCA officer’s evidence was heard in private.

During the open court hearing, it was heard how the Afghanistan nationals—whose names have been anonymised by the court—are said to have been part of an organised criminal group engaged in trafficking for labour and sexual exploitation and money laundering.

One of the appellants had been convicted of conspiring to assist unlawful immigration into the UK following an undercover operation by NCA.

During the 2020 sting, one—referred to as “D6”—asked an undercover police officer to smuggle people from mainland Europe into the UK in his lorry up to three times a month with a payment of £2,500 per person smuggled.

The court heard that D6 would meet the immigrants off the lorry and would pay the undercover officer himself, with the promise he would make “good money.”

In a number of meetings, the Afghan national—who had already received British citizenship—said that Albanians would be paying for the trip.

A smuggling operation was planned for November 2020 with a collection address in Belgium and drop-off address in Kent.

However, the plot fell through after D6 cancelled the arrangements because, he said, the other party had failed to pay the money up front.

Another individual implicated in the people smuggling operation—referred to as “D5”—was said by the NCA to have employed underage and illegal immigrants in a number of shops he either run or controlled, and was a senior ringleader in the smuggling operation.

Both men were later deprived of their citizenship and fled to Kabul before reentering the UK illegally and launching a legal challenge against the decision.

Shamima Begum being interviewed by Sky News in northern Syria on Feb. 17, 2019. The so-called ISIS bride has claimed she was radicalised both online and "between her circle of friends." Reuters

Begum Case

Earlier this year, the SIAC rejected an appeal by British born jihadi bride Shamima Begum, who travelled to Syria in February 2015, aged 15. She was deprived of her citizenship four years later.

The SIAC had previously ruled in 2020 that she was a citizen of Bangladesh, so would not be left stateless.

A separate appeal on other grounds, including that she was a victim of human trafficking, was rejected in February 2023.

A lawyer acting on behalf of the men cited the guidance used in the 2021 Supreme Court ruling in the case of Begum that: “The SIAC’s role on an appeal is to decide whether the Secretary of State acted in a way in which no reasonable decision-maker could have acted, or took account of an irrelevant matter, or failed to take account of a relevant matter, or erred in law.

“In other words, SIAC’s role is to carry out a public law review of the Secretary of State’s decision rather than to carry out a full merits-based appeal.”

The appellants argued that the Begum case only applied to national security cases.

Such cases involve an assessment of future risk to national security with the same not true of decisions based on concerns that a person has been involved in serious and organised crime.

This depends on past events rather than future risk. The lawyer said that as such, the home secretary must prove, on the balance of probabilities, that the appellants were involved in serious organised crime in order to justify the decisions under challenge.

SIAC rejected this argument saying that in both contexts, the key issue is whether deprivation of citizenship, or exclusion from the UK, is conducive to the public good.

This decision is entrusted to the home secretary, not SIAC.

The legislation makes no distinction between decisions based on national security and decisions based on other public interest considerations.

In short, the judges said the principles identified in the Begum case also apply to the present case, despite no national security concerns.

The government has increasingly used its powers to revoke the citizenship of hundreds of individuals in the last year.

A total of 316 people had their British citizenship removed on the basis of fraud or suspected terror links, the highest yearly number ever recorded.

The 2022 figures make up a third of all deprivations issued by the Home Office since 2010.