Mustafa*, a Palestinian from Syria, was finally freed to leave Thailand last month. After serving almost two years in a Thai jail and one month in an immigration detention facility on charges of illegally entering the country, the 38-year-old was released to be reunited with his young daughter and wife.
“I am glad he is free now, but it’s unfortunate the real cause of the problem has not been fixed,” said his lawyer Kohnwilai Teppunkoonngam.
Mustafa broke the law by using a fake passport to enter the country, but he was also a victim of an international people smuggling network, said Ms Kohnwilai.
The lawyer declined to reveal where he is now, since Mustafa will be co-operating with law enforcement agencies to help investigate the network that delivered him to Thailand more than two years ago.
“The real culprits are still out there,” said Ms Kohnwilai, referring to the smuggling ring described by Mustafa in his testimony to the Thai court.
Mustafa came to Thailand from the United Arab Emirates on a fake Greek passport, which he obtained from a Syrian migrant in England. He planned to travel onward to Sweden.
“There had to be more than one person involved in the case because it involved the forgery of travel documents, an agent and transit arrangements. Each has a different level of responsibility,” Ms Kohnwilai said.
The lawyer hopes local efforts to detect the smugglers will continue, even after Mustafa’s departure.
“Otherwise, the network may deceive others into coming to Thailand,” she said.
Mustafa knew at least three other Syrians who were tricked into travelling to Thailand in order to make their way to a third country. They were all jailed here on the same illegal entry charge.
“I don’t know what happened to them because they are facing different degrees of punishment based on their individual cases,” said the lawyer.
CON AGENTS AT WORK
Migrants from neighbouring countries usually travel to Thailand by land, but those from the Middle East and further afield arrive by air. “The people smuggling networks saw an opportunity to profit from these migrants, because their entry into the country involves several steps, such as obtaining falsified passports and overcoming immigration procedures,” she said.
Thailand is a popular transit country with those seeking a better life elsewhere, but many end up getting detained by immigration authorities here. Of these, some are the victims of conmen.
“I met one migrant who has been at the detention centre for five years,” said Ms Kohnwilai, who specialises in such cases.
“The authorities can’t send him anywhere because they can’t prove his nationality. Others are waiting desperately to be given refugee or asylum seeker status.”
Ms Kohnwilai worked on Musfata’s case for the Lawyers Council of Thailand, which agreed to represent him in June 2014.
“The council felt it would be unfair to look at the case through the lens of domestic law alone. Of course, he was guilty of using a fake passport to enter Thailand under Thai criminal law. But we wanted to look at the issue from an international perspective. We were punishing the victim of international crime.
“If we let the transnational smuggling networks get away with it, they will continue profiting from people who are suffering. It’s not fair,” she said.
DESPERATE MEASURES
Mustafa’s predicament highlights the plight of those who are desperate to escape war-torn countries but fall prey to conmen.
His parents originally left Palestine for Lebanon in 1948. They resettled and made a life for themselves in the Shatila refugee camp in Beirut, where Mustafa was born.
In 1982, the civil war in Lebanon resulted in an attack on the camp. Mustafa, then aged five, fled to Syria, moving into the Yarmouk refugee camp in Damascus.
“Having refugee status in Syria is different to how we perceive it in Thailand,” said Mr Kohnwilai. “Refugees there can go out and study or work every day.”
Mustafa built a life in Syria, training to become a communications engineer and getting himself a job working in IT. He married his Jordanian wife there and they had a daughter.
But civil war was to change his fate again in 2012, when the Syrian conflict escalated and spread to Damascus. Yarmouk camp was cut off from humanitarian assistance. In June 2012, Mustafa and his family were forced to leave the camp and hide out in Kora Al Assad, Damascus.
In August that year, his wife and three-month-old daughter fled to Jordan to escape the fighting. But Mustafa could not accompany them, because the Jordanian government denies entry to Palestinian refugees from Syria.
His wife moved to the UAE, and he joined her in Dubai in 2013. He was allowed to stay there temporarily as a spouse. But there were many restrictions on his movements and he was not allowed to work. “He was worried he would be forcibly repatriated to Syria at any moment,” his lawyer said.
Life in the UAE was also difficult for his family, because his daughter was not eligible for Jordanian citizenship through her mother.
Fearing his daughter would become a stateless child because of his own status, Mustafa contacted several foreign embassies in the UAE to request asylum.
But his requests were rejected since the countries could not consider an asylum application made abroad. Mustafa and his wife were told they would have to travel to the countries in question to apply for asylum directly.
On Sept 2, 2013, Mustafa learned from Al Jazeera that the Swedish government had unveiled a new policy to assist refugees from Syria.
“Due to his status as a temporary UAE resident and a stateless person, he was concerned he would not be able to obtain a legal visa to Sweden. He was approached online by a friend known as Mr A; also a Palestinian from Syria,” Ms Kohnwilai said.
“Mr A had already managed to obtain asylum status in the UK. The success of this person made him think it was possible to use illegal means to travel to Sweden and get asylum there.”
THE DECEPTION
Mr A told Mustafa he could arrange travel to Sweden via Thailand, using a passport from an EU country. They liaised through email and the Viber application.
“The friend lied and told him Thailand had signed an agreement with the EU to help refugees from Syria, particularly Palestinians. Mr A told him refugees from Syria would not be arrested in Thailand,” Ms Kohnwilai said.
Mr A claimed he had successfully entered the UK using a similar approach.
Mustafa was persuaded and agreed to buy a fake Greece passport for US$4,700 (about 167,000 baht). In October 2013, an accomplice of Mr A, known as Mr B, sent a courier package with the passport and an e-ticket for him to travel to Sweden via Thailand.
Mustafa flew into Thailand on December 2013 and stayed in a hotel on Sukhumvit before attempting to board a flight to Sweden. But he was arrested for using a fake passport when he checked in at Suvarnabhumi airport.
In spite of his petitions, the court sentenced him to two years in prison. He eventually served 21 months in a Samut Prakan jail. Thanks to a royal pardon, he was released two months ago but detained at an immigration facility for one month.
VULNERABLE TO ARREST
Vivian Tan, regional officer for United Nations High Commissioner for Refugee (UNHCR), was unable to comment on Mustafa’s individual case. “What I can say is that if someone has applied for asylum, he or she receives a UNHCR asylum-seeker certificate and is considered a person of concern to the UNHCR,” she said.
“However, if this person does not have a valid visa, then the Thai immigration act considers him/her to be in the country illegally.
“Like refugees and asylum-seekers of other nationalities in Bangkok, most from Syria arrive on their own with valid visas. However, some may later have problems renewing or extending their visas.
"In the absence of a legal framework for refugees in Thailand, they fall under the immigration act, which considers them illegal aliens if they don’t have valid visas.
“They are thus vulnerable to arrest and detention,” she said.
“UNHCR works with local authorities to remind them that people with UNHCR-issued documents should not be arrested or detained. When we hear about arrests, we intervene to try and prevent them.”
INTERNATIONAL REACH
Ms Kohnwilai said Mustafa’s crime was the result of his desperation to protect himself and his family from being deprived of their basic human rights.
She is calling on local law enforcement authorities to do more to investigate transnational trafficking networks and has raised the issue with the British embassy and international organisations.
Without preventive measures, she said, many more migrants risk falling victim, as the number of Syrians entering Thailand continues to rise.
Ms Kohnwilai cited immigration data showing a surge of Syrian migrants since the civil war escalated.
“Prior to the Syrian civil war, there were about 5,000 migrants from Syria to Thailand each year. However, after the war broke out in 2011, the annual numbers escalated to 7,000, not including those who fall prey to smugglers,” she said.
People smuggling has become an international crisis, she added. “We see the phenomenon in Europe where asylum seekers from Africa and Arab countries try to reach the continent regardless of how dangerous the route.”
She urged Thailand to sign up to the International Migrant Smuggling Protocol. This would require authorities here to make people smugglers punishable under domestic law. It would also allow for international collaboration on suppressing migrant smuggling and border control.
Without the legal framework of the protocol, Ms Kohnwilai said it’s easy for non-party states such as Thailand to prosecute migrants, instead of the real criminals.
“It means we encourage the business of smugglers, providing the opportunity for them to work freely in society and putting the victims instead of the criminals in jail,” she said.
If the issue is not addressed, the future looks bleak, she said. “Thailand will potentially become a safe haven for criminals who want to carry out illegal activities and shady business dealings,” she warned.
“This would only intensify our problems with corruption, ultimately making Thailand an unsafe country.”
*Names have been changed.
