The Flourishing Black Market in Syrian Passports
Two men—a dead suicide bomber and a man in a Serbian migrant center—carried the same Syrian passport with the same details.
Who was Ahmad al-Mohammad?
Was he one of the suicide bombers in Friday’s attacks on Paris who was found with his passport near his body? Or was he a man with the same name—and same passport details—who was arrested Saturday at a Serbian refugee center?
It may turn out neither man was named Ahmad al-Mohammad, and, in fact, there may be several others in Europe with the same name and identical passport details. Indeed, Agence France-Presse reported Wednesday that Ahmad al-Mohammad was born in 1990, served as a soldier in the Syrian army, and died months ago. The passport, AFP reports, bore his details.
The Syrian Civil War, and the refugee crisis it has created, has spawned a black market in fake Syrian passports. These documents are highly sought after by Syrian refugees desperate to leave their country, migrants from other nations hoping to enter Europe posing as Syrians, and, apparently, militants who use them to enter Europe for operations such as the one that shook Paris and the world last Friday.
Indeed, even before Friday’s attack, Frontex, the European Union’s border agency, had warned of the proliferation of fake Syrian passports, pointing out that many who possessed them were economic migrants rather than Syrians fleeing civil war.
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/11/fake-syrian-passports/416445/?utm_source=SFTwitter
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how this fact is a surprise to anyone. Fake IDs of whatever kind make the most fast cash are so common everywhere that I guess nobody bothers to mention it anymore.
