Source: Swedish Public Broadcasting, AINA
By Nuri Kino and Tove Svenonius
In Sweden, the asylum policies are getting tougher, making it more difficult to get asylum for legitimate refugees. These policies lead to a new kind of crime where Iraqis who have been denied asylum go underground and try to get their relatives to Europe illegally. Swedish Radio reported that some of them buy residence permits to help their relatives.
A Swedish Radio reporter met an Iraqi man who sells residence permits, and who also plans to buy permits for his own family. "This is a Swedish residence permit," he showed the reporter.
"Without a name?"
"Yes, it's empty and we can do whatever we want with it," the man tells him.
He shows a sticker; it looks like a page from a passport; it has Swedish stamps, watermarks, and the heading reads, "Residence Permit." The sticker looks exactly like the stickers foreigners get in their passports when they are granted residence permits in Sweden.
These stickers can be bought illegally in the streets of Stockholm.
"It costs 2000 euros for one person," the man says.
We met him several times in the Stockholm area. He also lives in hiding after being denied asylum in Sweden, but says he cannot return to his home country Iraq. To get his family out of Iraq, he wants to buy them stickers with residence permits. That was how he came into contact with the people organizing the sale of stickers.
But he claims he doesn't know who is organizing this racket.
"I don't know who they are," says the man. "My friend says don't ask anything if you want stickers. Say yes and pay. If you don't want them, don't say anything."
Several refugees in hiding told Swedish Radio there are stickers with residence permits that can be bought. An Iraqi man says he bought two stickers for his family in Iraq. With these stickers in their passports his family can travel to Europe, and the whole family can seek asylum together. And the salesman says that with a sticker inserted correctly into your passport you can travel freely in Europe.
But a sticker with a Swedish residence permit is not enough. The sticker also has to be incorporated into a passport in the proper way, and to do that you need a special sticker printer.
According to the Swedish authorities, only the Migration Board has sticker printers. But, since all Schengen countries share the same system for residence permits, the man who sells residence permits in Stockholm tells Swedish Radio that it is possible to send sold stickers to Greece, where they have the same kind of sticker printers.
"I send the passports to Greece, and then I buy a residence sticker and send it to them as well."
"And they know how to do this?" the reporter asked.
"Yes, I know them"
It is difficult to tell an authentic sticker from a forged one.
The Swedish Migration Board says no stickers have been stolen. Swedish police have not received any information of stolen stickers. But the man claim his stickers are authentic.
"They are original."
"Are they stolen? From the Migration board?"
"Of course. From where else?"