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'TREATED PEOPLE LIKE ANIMALS'

Light streams in through a stained glass window in the former chapel that serves as a courtroom in Bruges, Belgium.

Hewa Rahimpur sits surrounded by other criminal defendants. He is casually dressed in jeans, trainers and a black top.

He paints himself as a middle-man - guilty of involvement, but not the main player. "I'm not a boss," he states.

Arriving in the UK hidden aboard a lorry in 2016, Rahimpur claimed asylum, saying he faced persecution at home in Iran.

He tried to set up a barber's shop, but the business fizzled out. Then he rented a small shop front in Ilford and used it to set up a food kiosk.

"He was like gold," said Linda, the hairdresser in the shop next door who rented him the space. "He was paying his rent like normal. Now I'm finding out more things about him - on his contract, he's not married.

"I didn't know he had kids. He always talked about his mum, but we never saw her. He was nice to everyone around here."

He was arrested while driving an expensive Mercedes-Benz S Class car. His lawyer said it was merely a hire car, not a sign of wealth. But it was definitely a very fancy car for a man running a small sweet kiosk.

According to the prosecutor, Frank Demeester, that's because Rahimpur was never a small cog, but rather the operator of a whole machine "that treated people like animals, or cargo".

Demeester reads aloud text messages from frantic passengers on board a dinghy that was travelling between France and England.

A passenger says: "We don't want to die."

Rahimpur writes back: "Just go, and inshallah you will get there."

"These people use the worst possible quality of dinghy," the prosecutor adds. "The life jackets are bad quality too, and many passengers don't get one. They don't buy good engines. It's all about money."

DREAMS OF A 'SIMPLE LIFE'

We know that Rahimpur's small shop was being used as a payment centre for people-smuggling. The one thing he admits to is taking money from those who had arrived safely in Britain, and then arranging for it to be passed on to smugglers on the other side of the Channel. He would take a slice of each transaction.

He told the court in Belgium that he never wanted to be involved in smuggling, but instead aspired to a "simple life" when he was granted asylum.

When his brother, who was himself travelling across Europe, became seriously ill, Rahimpur focused on paying for his treatment and trying to get him to Britain.

And, so he says, once he'd paid the smugglers for that journey, he got sucked into their organisation.

When he's told he faces a lengthy prison sentence and may never see his ill mother again he sinks into his seat, briefly visibly distraught.

But it's not long before his expression hardens again. The other defendants in the court look nervous and anxious. But Rahimpur simply stares into space, his face blank.

ON THE TRAIL

The first clue comes from a source - someone who knows the world of smuggling inside out. Rahimpur, they tell us, isn't from Iran, and isn't called Rahimpur. His actual name is said to be Hama Khoshnaw, and he's from Kurdistan - a semi-autonomous region in the north of Iraq.

The only way to find out more about this man is by travelling to the place we think he calls home - Kurdistan.

Once we arrive, getting a phone number for a people smuggler is relatively easy, but organising a face-to-face meeting proves trickier.

I'm sitting in a cafe overlooking a lake when the phone rings. It's a smuggler who says he'll speak as long as his face, voice and location are all hidden. He wants to explain what motivates him.

We meet that afternoon. The smuggler, *Karwan, turns up with three other men, all members of his group - he doesn't like the word "gang" - and accepts the offer of a cup of hot tea.

'THEY SHOULD MAKE STATUES OF US'

I pull out my phone. On it is a photo of Hewa Rahimpur. I show it to Karwan and ask if he knows him. He nods. Is this Hama Khoshnaw? He nods again.

"I know him - he's from Erbil. I saw him once in Turkey, but I wasn’t part of his group. If he has committed a crime then he should pay," says Karwan.

"But my name should not be tarnished because of what he has done. I'm not a criminal. They should make statues of people like us. We should be celebrated."

'RESCUED FROM MISERY'

Karwan says he gets dozens of phone calls every day from people "asking to be rescued from their misery".

"They study for 20 years but they can't get a government job. After all these years of study. They are professors but sell drinking water. Life is not stable."

They ask to be taken somewhere else - most often Germany, but frequently the UK. Then they decide on a route, because different journeys have different prices.

Some need help getting out of Kurdistan. Some already have a passport to reach Turkey. All need help getting across Europe.

You're a criminal, I point out, adding that the British government see people smugglers as a scourge. He seems bemused at the idea.

"Anyone who goes to Britain, France and Germany is interviewed when they arrive. They ask why someone migrated, why they went to that particular country and are seeking protection. Smugglers don't force people to migrate."

"If I don't deceive someone of their money, if I don't insult them or take advantage of their honour, and if I take them on a good route, why would I be prosecuted?" Karwan adds.

Could the British government thwart him? Rishi Sunak has promised to stop the boats, after all.

"You can't stop smuggling," Karwan says, smiling.

"If you close this door on me then I'll enter from another door. If you close this house, I'll do my job from the next house."

THE SUPPLY ROUTES

Another of his team, *Sirwan, is a veteran of the migrant camps that dot northern France. He works there as a middle-man, connecting migrants and smugglers and taking a cut of the price.

In contrast to his boss, he willingly accepts what he does is against the law: "It is dangerous and illegal.

"If you get caught by the shore, you get six years [in prison] in France. Either you accept what the consequences could be, or you don't do this."

He's heard of Hama Khoshnaw, but says the focus has fallen on the wrong person.

"There are smugglers who have drowned many people and not been arrested. There are people who have murdered, and not been caught. This guy fell into a trap."

But how do smugglers get all those dinghies, those outboard motors, all the paraphernalia of smuggling, into Europe? For Sirwan, it's commonplace.

He describes the process of buying dinghies. "If you buy it in Germany and collect it there, it is cheap, but if they have to take it to France, because it is difficult to get there, then it is more expensive.

"In Turkey the lorry drivers place it under the load. Let's say you have a contract with a major company to send them sofas, they hide up to ten dinghies under the load of each lorry. So ten trucks could carry at least 50 dinghies. And then they go into storage."

This is almost exactly how Rahimpur's gang worked - dinghies were sourced through Turkey and brought into Europe to be stored in a few locations, principally in the German town of Osnabruck.

That's one of the keys - getting the equipment to the right place. But more importantly is how money is handled.

BANKING WITH NO PAPER TRAIL

The financial side of the smuggling operation relies on a system of banking known as "Hawala" which is dependent on trust and honour.

Here's how it works.

Imagine I'm in London, and I owe £1,000 to a friend in Erbil. I go to a trusted broker, known as a Hawaldar, and explain how much I owe and to whom. I also supply a password which I've agreed with my friend.

The Hawaldar will charge me a small fee. He then contacts another Hawaldar, this time based in Erbil, and tells him the terms, along with the password.

My friend can then go along to the Erbil Hawaldar, and pick up the money, after supplying the password and paying a small fee of their own.

The process leaves behind almost no paper or electronic trail.

Compared to mainstream banking, it is all but invisible. For smugglers, it is the perfect mechanism.

In theory, it works for both sides. The smugglers agree a price and know they will get paid - but only if they do what they promise.

The person being smuggled only has to pay if they reach their destination. It's a sort of "cash on delivery" agreement, where you're the parcel.

The Hawaldar system is the one thing that Rahimpur admitted to being involved with in court. He made it sound peripheral, but that single admission puts him at the heart of the gang.

A BETTER LIFE

It's not hard to find people who want to be smuggled. We walk into Erbil's main square and within moments two young men come up to us.

They are both 19 years old, from Kirkuk in Iraq, and are determined to get to Britain.

"I am confident - 100%," says Peshawa. "I know the smugglers and he told me - if I don't get you there, then don't pay me."

Next to him is his friend, Harem, wearing an oversize pair of sunglasses. His huge smile disappears when I ask him why he wants to go to Britain.

"There is no work here. I'm hoping I can get there and do something. The least is you can go to school, get an education. And you get an allowance."

It is an optimistic view of Britain and it is one I have heard often - that migrants will be welcomed and supported.

Before we write this off as naïvety, let's remember that in their formative years, Peshawa and Harem heard daily stories of how the Islamic State terror group was closing in on their homes.

Set against that, a perilous trip to a new life probably seems a little less daunting.

Not everyone agrees. Dr Dindar Zebari, the Kurdistan Regional Government's coordinator for international advocacy, is adamant that people-smuggling from his country is not a significant problem.

"Cross-border trafficking is present everywhere but I think in the area of Kurdistan, we have been quite strict and we have put policies and strategies in place.

"Human trafficking is something that has existed for decades and continues everywhere in the world."

He says Kurdistan has specific training and even intelligence sharing with the UK for the purpose of combatting smugglers.

'NOBODY CAN STOP US'

In Erbil, the streets reverberate with the sounds of daily life - market traders, cars, birds, chatter and the endless stirring of tea.

This is where Hama Khoshnaw came from. It's the city he left to head towards a new life and a new identity in Britain.

Erbil remains a city where people-smuggling thrives because so many people here want to get out. Supply and demand dictates the rest.

Rahimpur's arrest and his prison sentence are intended to be a deterrent - a warning that European police forces will work together to thwart smugglers.

And it does set a precedent of cooperation across borders, of intelligence being shared and criminals being caught. But the problem is that Rahimpur and his gang will have been replaced immediately.

"I am not worried," says the smuggler Karwan, when I ask if the net is closing.

"We are always looking to open new routes, we are persistent. I don’t think any country can stop the illegal routes.

"They can build four walls and 15 rows of barbed wire. The walls will be brought down and the wires will be cut. A new route will be found."

*Names have been changed