Violent Channel-smuggling gangs French and UK network exposed by undercover BBC investigation

A BBC investigation has exposed the French and UK operations of a powerful and violent smuggling gang taking people across the English Channel in small boats.

A reporter, posing as a migrant wanting to cross, helped us gain unprecedented access to the smugglers notorious forest hideout in northern France - an area plagued by armed battles between rival gangs.

Secret filming at a major UK railway station also captured associates of the gang collecting cash payments to secure migrant places on illegal Channel crossings.

Two men met us on separate occasions on the busy concourse at Birminghams New Street Station to collect envelopes containing hundreds of pounds.

Multiple sources have described how gang leaders, who keep one step ahead of the authorities by changing mobile phone numbers and the gangs name, subjected their henchmen and migrants to violent beatings.

We have managed to identify three men - Jabal, Aram and al-Millah - all Iraqi-Kurds, who are believed to lead the outfit, which is one of the main groups in northern France transporting people to the UK by small boat.

We have also come across other senior figures, including a man called Abdullah, whom we witnessed shepherding groups of migrants towards boats. Another gang member, Besha, who had escorted migrants in France, took a small boat to the UK himself, we learned, ending up in a migrant hostel in West Yorkshire having claimed asylum.

The findings are the culmination of months of undercover fieldwork and the creation of multiple fake identities to engage with the smugglers. We have been able to build a detailed picture of the gangs tentacle-like structure and the ways it has successfully evaded the police.

Our investigation began in April 2024, after we witnessed French police trying to stop the gang from launching an inflatable boat into the Channel. In the chaos, five people were trampled to death onboard, including a 7-year-old girl named Sarah.

"Theres no danger," said smuggler Abdullah last week, as he spoke to our undercover colleague and gestured towards a cluster of tents hidden deep within a forest outside the French port of Dunkirk.

"You are welcome to stay here. Well get a boat ready nearby and set to sea. We need to move early to avoid the police - its a cat and mouse game," Abdullah continued, with the reassuring smile of an airline official at a check-in counter. "God willing, the weather will be on our side."

The trip across the Channel would be with "a mixture of Somalis, Sudanese, Kurds and so on", he explained, boasting about two successful launches the previous week, with 55 people on each.

"Should I bring a lifejacket?" asked our colleague, an Arabic-speaking BBC reporter, posing as a Syrian migrant and wearing a hidden camera.

"Thats really up to you," the smuggler replied.

Criss-crossed by narrow sandy paths, the forest is beside a main road, a huge canal and a train line, some 4km (2.5 miles) from the French coast. For years, rival gangs and their customers have hidden from the French police here - the gangs spotters carefully guarding every possible entrance.

Deadly gun battles and stabbings are not uncommon here, particularly during the summer, as gangs settle scores and compete over the lucrative and highly competitive small-boat people-smuggling industry. The day after our encounter, we heard of another fatal shooting.

Abdullah was, we knew, an increasingly powerful and trusted figure in a gang that has emerged as one of the key players in northern France.

It is one of perhaps four gangs now managing crossings and specific launch areas themselves - rather than simply supplying passengers like many of the smaller gangs.

Abdullah was, we suspected, a close relative of a more senior figure. Well-dressed, friendly, and constantly on the phone with clients, he seemed entirely at ease in the forest.

"No worries," he smiled, as our undercover colleague declined the offer of an overnight stay in the camp and left.

A few days later we would be following the gang and its paying clients towards the coast, as they tried to hide from the police, through the night, in a different wooded area.

Abdullah would even try to convince our reporting team that he was just another desperate person trying to reach the UK, rather than a smuggler making hundreds of thousands of pounds by risking peoples lives in the Channel.

When we first began to investigate the gang, it was known to those using its services as The Mountain (or Jabal, in Arabic). That was the word customers would use when making payments - and the word we had heard from those who had been on Sarahs ill-fated boat.

We soon learned that Jabal was also the name of one of the gangs leaders, all from the same area of Iraqi Kurdistan, near the city of Sulaymaniyah.

Jabal controlled logistics from Belgium and France. Another man, Aram, had spent time in Europe but now appeared to be back in Iraq, possibly more involved in drumming up new customers. The third leader, even more shadowy than the others, was known as al-Millah (The Chief in English). He appeared to take a lead on the gangs financial operations.

In June 2024, we tracked down Jabal to a migrant reception centre in Luxembourg and confronted him on the street. He denied any involvement and, although we promptly informed the French police, quickly disappeared.

"He fled after your intervention in Luxembourg, and he changed his phone and probably fled abroad," said Xavier Delrieu, who heads the French polices anti-smuggling unit. "His whereabouts are now unknown. The investigation is continuing."

Delrieu later told us there had been "one arrest [of an Iraqi] linked to Sarahs death", but declined to give any further information, citing operational secrecy. We do not believe Jabal has been arrested.

"As long as it is profitable, theyre going to continue," said Delrieu.

Pascal Marconville, lead prosecutor at the regional Court of Appeal for northern France, agreed: "Its like chess. And they have [the advantage] on the board. So, theyre always one step ahead of us."

It is a gloomy assessment, backed up by some of our own findings during this investigation, and it shows how difficult it may be for UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer to deliver on his promise to "smash the gangs".

The UK-French "one-in, one-out" pilot scheme, now in force, will "deliver real results", says Mr Starmer. The deal will see some of those arriving in small boats detained and returned to France.

After Jabals disappearance in Luxembourg, we returned to northern France to continue our investigation. We spoke to more than a dozen people who had used the gang to reach - or to try to reach - the UK by small boat.

With their help, and by analysing other footage we had filmed the night of Sarahs death, we identified several junior gang members - known as "small hands" or simply "guides" in Kurdish, including some who had helped launch Sarahs boat.

We tracked the small hands on their social media accounts as they moved around Europe, often seeming to flaunt their wealth.

One middle-ranking smuggler known as Besha, we learned, had left on a small boat with his Iranian girlfriend to claim asylum in the UK. We had first begun following him, undercover, as he escorted groups of migrants from Calais to Boulogne train station, ahead of attempts to cross the Channel.

Months later, we tracked him and his girlfriend to a migrant hostel in Wakefield, West Yorkshire. We staked it out for three days but lost track of them when they left suddenly.

After Sarahs death, and the extensive publicity it attracted, the gang changed its name from The Mountain, to Ghali Ghali. It is an unusual Arabic and Kurdish phrase that may perhaps be best translated as "Exclusive".

For a time, we heard lots of talk of Ghali Ghali, both online and at the train and bus stations in Calais and beyond. The gang was known to be cheap and relatively reliable. Some people who had failed to cross the Channel with the group said they had been reimbursed promptly. For plenty of migrants, the gangs are seen primarily not as dangerous criminals but as entrepreneurs offering a valuable service.

Then the gang changed its name twice more - firstly to al-Millah, the nickname of the shadowy third gang leader, and then to Kaka, which means Brother but is also, we believe, another of his nicknames. More recently at least two other names have been used.

Unlike many other gangs - who advertise prominently online, particularly on TikTok, using videos of crossings and other scenes, and seek to appeal to particular ethnic groups - our gang has kept a low profile. It works with a wide range of nationalities, particularly from Iraq and Africa, and seems to rely for business on reputation and word of mouth.

But that reputation has continued to be affected by news of more deaths in the Channel. We discovered at least seven more people - after the initial five on Sarahs boat - had died in two separate incidents while attempting to cross with the gang.

On land, disturbing evidence of the gangs violence has also emerged.

Earlier this year, two sources told us the shadowy figure, al-Millah, was running the gangs operations in the forest near Dunkirk. Independently, our sources both described a scene, one winters day, when he ordered his small hands to stand in a line, before tying one of them to a tree and beating him severely. It seems the boss suspected the man of stealing money.

Al-Millah is "the leader" a young woman told us, separately, by text. "No [migrants] meet him. They are all family… they are also theifs [sic]."

We had met the woman at a food distribution point run by local charities outside Dunkirk. She had paid the gang for a crossing, she said, but had waited for two months in the forest camp and been disturbed by the abuse she had encountered.

In her texts, she described how she feared one of al-Millahs henchmen, whom she called "Abdulah".

"He put a gun in [sic] my head one night. He is a very dangerous guy he slap me so many times," she wrote - before sharing a brief video she had secretly filmed of him.

Based on that video, and on other details, we believe this is the same Abdullah our undercover reporter would go on to meet in the forests around Dunkirk.

A few days later, on what she said was her 13th attempt, the woman crossed to the UK with a different gang. She has since broken off contact with us.

It was at this point that we stepped up our investigation - trying to engage more directly with the gang and penetrate its operations.

While its leaders had repeatedly changed phone numbers, we managed to confirm that one mobile number belonging to al-Millah remained in use.

We later learned the phone had been handed over to Abdullah, who had apparently taken over the running of operations in Dunkirk.

Two weeks ago, we made a strategic visit to Brussels - a common transit point for migrants heading to the coast of northern France. Having already used multiple fake identities to contact Abdullah on his mobile, we now rang him again.

We knew it was important to be careful when making such a call. The gang would often ask customers to send a pin to confirm their location, and then to make a video call to back that up and to ensure they were genuine.

Standing on a street near Brussels Gare Du Midi, our Arab-speaking colleague, posing as a migrant called "Abu Ahmed", came straight to the point.

"Hello. Brother, Im travelling alone. I want to leave quickly, please. Do you have a departure tomorrow, the day after, or this week?"

"Tomorrow, God willing," Abdullah replied.

"I prefer to pay in the UK if possible. My money is in a safe place there."

This was not an unusual or suspicious request for us to make. Although some people carry cash with them, many others arrange to pay the smugglers through bank transfers or via intermediaries in a range of countries including Turkey, Germany, Belgium and the UK. The money sometimes goes directly to the gang, or it can be held "in trust" to be handed over only after a successful crossing.

We wanted to expose the gangs links in the UK, having already tracked one member to Wakefield.

"OK. The price is €1,400," said Abdullah - over £1,200. He seemed in a rush.

A few hours later in a text, he sent us a UK mobile phone number and indicated his own name "Abdullah" should be used as a payment reference, along with the single word "Birmingham".

Leaving our colleague Abu Ahmed to make his own way to the French coast, we rushed to Birmingham to arrange payment. Handing money over to criminals is not something we do lightly - but in this instance we decided there was a public interest in doing so as it was the only way we could further expose the gang and its wider network.

A few hours later, having arranged for a separate BBC colleague, who also speaks Arabic, to pose as one of Abu Ahmeds relatives in the UK and to hand over an envelope containing the cash, we staked out a meeting place in the centre of Birminghams New Street. Abdullah had given us a UK phone number for his contact, and we arranged to meet the man beside a giant metal sculpture of a bull.

Our colleague stood, silently, as the crowds flowed around him. We sat on benches nearby, scanning each face, waiting to see if someone would show up, or if the gang had become suspicious of our plan.

Ten minutes later, and on time, someone showed up.

"Greetings, brother."

"Its all here," said our colleague, holding up the money to show to a bearded man with a glass eye. The man said his name was Bahman, and that he had been sent by his uncle.

Bahman appeared relaxed and unsuspecting as the two men briefly chatted in the middle of the busy concourse, as we secretly filmed their encounter.

"Cash is a problem. I swear, its a problem," said Bahman, implying that he was not simply a "runner" sent to collect the cash, but someone with at least a passing knowledge of the broader operation. He did not explain why cash was a "problem" but took the money - an agreed payment of £900, about three-quarters of the total smugglers bill - and left.

Small boat passengers can deposit money for their crossing in holding accounts in the UK and elsewhere using "hawala" brokers. It is a global honour system, widely used in the Middle East, in particular, that enables the transfer of money via mutually trusted third parties.

But there is a fee payable to businesses offering such a service. The fact that Bahman did not ask for any extra money strongly suggested he was not simply an agent or middleman, but directly linked to our gang in France.

We then travelled back to Dunkirk, where our colleague Abu Ahmed was finally in a credible position to make direct contact with Abdullah in the forest.

Abdullah told us he had received confirmation from Birmingham that most of the money for a crossing had been handed over. We had deliberately left a sum unpaid to give our colleague a good reason to meet Abdullah in his camp, rather than joining the group later as it headed south along the coast to attempt a crossing.

With two undercover security guards watching his back from a distance, Abu Ahmed walked towards the forest, following the directions that Abdullah handed out, one texted detail at a time, until he was told to leave the road and clamber down a steep bank. There, he handed over another €400 (£348) to Abdullah, as agreed, before making his excuses, explaining he was staying with other friends in Calais who were also seeking to cross to England.

Two days later, our undercover reporter received confirmation from Abdullah that an attempted crossing would be made early the next morning.

"We are waiting for you near the main station in Boulogne," Abdullah said in one of several brief voice messages.

The weather forecast in the Channel was ideal. Hardly a breath of wind. As we had often observed before, French police were already positioned outside the bus and train stations in Dunkirk, Calais and Boulogne - the main gathering points for migrants moving to the beaches. But they made no attempt to stop anyone boarding.

Instead, their aim appeared to be to gather information about numbers of people and locations, to help work out where they might later have the best chance of intercepting and destroying the inflatable boats the gangs would, inevitably, head towards.

Slashing the inflatable boats with knives before they reach the sea has become the polices main method to prevent launches. As a result, the gangs have begun to change tactics.

Roughly half of all the small boats crossing the Channel are now so-called "taxi-boats" - a police source told us - launched with few or no passengers and in secret. The craft then cruise along the coastline to pick up people waiting in the shallows.

"Forty-three tickets," said one of the small hands, addressing a bus driver, as he and a crowd of mostly African men and women clustered at the door, alongside our undercover colleague. It was a familiar scene, with different smuggling gangs all arranging for their customers to gather and to travel along the French coastline on public transport towards different launch spots.

Our colleague, Abu Ahmed, initially travelled with the migrants, but - for his own safety - we had agreed he would slip away from the group before nightfall, and before they got close to the beaches.

From a distance, we watched Abdullah walk across a street in Boulogne, having accompanied some of his passengers there from Dunkirk and Calais. He wore black and carried a large backpack. More people arrived, and sat or lay near him, behind some bushes at a bus stop. They waited for several hours, until early evening, before getting on a local bus heading south towards Ecault beach, an area we knew was a favourite launch spot for the gang.

By seven that evening, with our cameras in plain sight, we were openly following Abdullah and perhaps 40 other people, as they walked down a sandy path through the woods and towards the long straight expanse of Ecault beach. Many in the group hid their faces from us but made no move to discourage us from filming, as they moved, suddenly, away from the path and then sat down in a wooded area.

Only one person in the group agreed to talk to us. It was Abdullah himself.

In quiet, halting English, he claims he was an Iranian migrant called Ahmed, and that this was his second, or possibly third, attempt to cross.

Perhaps Abdullah thought that by telling journalists this story, he was building a useful public alias that he might use later - like others in the gang have done - if he ever sought to claim asylum in the UK.

Abruptly, the sound of police radios in the distance brought all conversation to an end. The group of migrants - including many Somalis, some Sudanese, and possibly some Iranian families - sat in total silence for perhaps an hour.

Eventually two French gendarmes spotted them through the undergrowth and walked, slowly, forwards. The younger officer held a canister of pepper spray in his right hand, and it seemed as if all eyes in the group were fixed on it.

"Women?" asked the older office in English.

"Babies?" he continued and walked around the group counting heads. We had heard the police tend to intervene more often when there are babies involved. The officers also checked our teams press cards as we sat nearby.

"Fifteen women. Forty people in all," the officer concluded, and then, affably enough, he offered a parting, "good luck".

A few hours later, as darkness fell, one sombre-looking family left. Their child, a boy of perhaps 10 years old, was coughing heavily. A single policeman remained, leaning on a nearby tree and occasionally shining a torch towards the rest of the group, until about 23:00, when he left.

The tension quickly melted away. Grins flashed in the darkness. For all the weariness and the risk, the younger men in the group seemed buoyed by a collective sense of adventure. By 02:00, the last muttered conversations faded away. It was now a cold, silent night, broken only by snores, the occasional yelp of someone dreaming, and the hoot of a single owl.

At about 06:30 the following morning, word spread through the group. The police had found whatever boat the gang had prepared for them overnight - we had seen Abdullah disappear into the darkness for at least an hour at one point - and destroyed it.

Quietly, people stood up, gathered their lifejackets and blankets and, following Abdullah and his team, began to walk back up the path towards the closest bus stop to head back to their camps and wait for another chance to cross.

Meanwhile, we had another journey to make, and a confrontation.

We had considered seeing if we could get a reimbursement from Abdullah by claiming that our colleague, Abu Ahmed, had changed his mind about the crossing. Instead, we decided it was more important to try to challenge the gangs UK-based associates. And so, later that same day, our undercover reporter called Abdullah one more time.

Abu Ahmed said his two friends in Calais also wanted to cross, and that he had left Abdullahs group on the bus because he preferred to travel with his friends. Could they pay in Birmingham too? Just like the last time?

The next day, we were back at New Street Station again. It was a near identical repeat of our earlier visit there, except this time, when a different unnamed man - also young, and bearded - arrived beside the bull sculpture to collect yet more cash for the smuggling gang, we broke cover and walked straight up to him, our cameras rolling.

"Were from BBC News. We know youre linked to a people smuggling gang…"

The man looked around, momentarily confused, his eyes darting. Then he turned and broke into a frantic sprint, heading to the station exit and across the street beyond before vanishing into the city.

A few days later, we called Abdullah and by phone and asked him about his smuggling activities. At first, he denied any wrongdoing. Then offered us money. Then he said he needed to call his boss. Then he hung up.

With additional reporting by our unnamed undercover reporters, Kathy Long, Paul Pradier, Marianne Baisnee, and Lea Guedj