home office Officials are being duped by fraudulent asylum seekers falsely claiming to be from war-torn Eritrea, a Mail investigation has revealed.
In several video calls seen by this newspaper, migrants brazenly boasted about how they gained asylum in the UK while pretending to be persecuted by Eritrea’s authoritarian regime.
Instead they come from: EthiopiaIt is a neighboring and much safer East African country.
MailOnline has discovered a network of thousands of people sharing huge amounts of educational material to convince case officers that they are from Eritrea. Because the success rate for asylum applications is 99%.
Eritreans have made up the fourth largest group of asylum seekers in the UK over the past three years, despite their population being just 3.6 million.
Michaele Abraham, an Ethiopian immigrant Uber Driver resides LondonIt received tens of thousands of views. TikTok There he brags about how he gained asylum in Britain by posing as an Eritrean and teaches others how to do the same.
Ethiopian immigrant Michael Abraha (pictured), an Uber driver living in London, has garnered tens of thousands of views on TikTok, where he pretends to be Eritrean and boasts about being granted asylum in the UK.
Photo: Abandoned tank wrecked in a village in Eritrea – a remnant of a 30-year conflict with neighboring Ethiopia.
The Home Office said it had now launched an investigation into Abraha after the MoS submitted evidence to his claims.
Robert JenrickThe former immigration secretary described the Mail’s bombshell findings last night as a ‘national security emergency’.
Mr Jenrick said: ‘Sir Keir Starmer has surrendered to a smuggling gang. Like my amendment, which was supported by my colleagues, he would grant amnesty to illegal boat migrants instead of strengthening his plan to eliminate them in a matter of days. It is now open season and these ministers are taking our country for a ride.
‘This is a national security emergency and the British people are understandably sick of it. It has to stop.’
Today’s investigation revealed how:
• Abraha tells immigrants to pretend to be under 18 to speed up asylum claims and explains how to ‘act like children’.
• In a Telegram group with 3,500 members, Ethiopians are sharing an educational guide on how to pretend to be Eritrean. It includes photos and documentation of famous buildings, different regions, currency and traditional clothing.
• An Ethiopian migrant said he used his asylum application blueprint to grant asylum to 12 other Ethiopians.
Eritrea is called the ‘North Korea of Africa’ due to its indefinite military conscription. The UN has pointed out that such conscription amounts to forced labor or even slavery, as well as a torturous detention system and systematic suppression of basic freedoms.
Photo: In a TikTok video, Abraha teaches other immigrants how to fool the Home Office by pretending to be Eritrean.
Pictured: Border Force officials escorting migrants to Dover dock in Kent earlier this week.
Eritrea is called ‘North Korea of Africa’ due to indefinite conscription (Photo: Eritrean Armed Forces during a military parade)
But although parts of Ethiopia have experienced conflict, poverty and severe drought, it is Africa’s fastest-growing economy and hosts more than 823,000 refugees, most of them from Eritrea.
The British government says refugees allowed to stay in the UK should not be able to live safely in any part of the country without fear of persecution.
Abraha, who lives with his family in a Southwark council flat, proudly flaunted his Ethiopian identity to his 16,000 TikTok followers, while also admitting that he had applied for asylum in the UK as an Eritrean.
Posting under the name ‘Miki Abrere’, he hosts weekly TikTok sessions teaching Ethiopians how to apply for fake asylum. For its research, MailOnline translated several hours of Abrahah’s footage from Amharic, a language spoken in Ethiopia but rarely spoken in Eritrea.
In one call, Abraha told an Ethiopian who feared he may have made a mistake in a screening interview that could reveal he was not Eritrean: ‘Please tell me you were nervous, unprepared and misquoted.’ He said. He also tells viewers to ‘attend events hosted by Eritreans’ and ‘document your activities with Eritreans’ to help them apply for asylum.
In another blatant example of fraud, Abraha explains in one video how to pretend to be under 18 to speed up your asylum application.
“The best way is to grow your hair out and let the long ends fall forward,” he said. Some men with youthful faces use this method.
Photo: Screenshot of a WhatsApp group set up to provide migrants with information on how to apply for asylum in the UK by posing as Eritrean refugees.
Photo: Three boys sit on a wall riddled with bullet holes in Ginda, Eritrea.
The Home Office said it had now launched an investigation into Abraha after the MoS submitted evidence to his claims.
‘Your actions matter too. Act like a child or you might get caught. They said that after staying at a hotel as immigrant minors, when they came downstairs to eat or go to the reception, they were covered in blankets and the hotel staff treated them like children.’
In another live video call on TikTok, the Mail found six other Ethiopians who had admitted to successfully claiming asylum as Eritreans.
From 2010 to March 2024, approximately 35,000 asylum applications were filed where applicants said they were from Eritrea. This figure is close to 1% of Korea’s population of approximately 3.6 million.
Between 2018 and 2024, 5,222 asylum seekers were approved for people claiming to be from Eritrea. This is more than the 4,882 Syrians, despite the country’s population being about 22.1 million. Both countries had the highest success rates, with 99% of applications approved.
Alp Mehmet, chairman of the Migration Watch UK campaign group, said: ‘It’s no surprise that this old ruse is still widely used.
‘Go to the UK illegally, destroy everything that could identify you, make up stories you can’t verify, and you stay home and dry. It’s scary to think how many of the backlogged people currently seeking asylum or residence permits have lied about who they are and where they came from. We were absolutely beside ourselves.’
A Home Office spokesperson said: “We are committed to ensuring that the asylum system is not abused and that protection is only granted to those who truly need it.”
‘We investigate these claims and will always seek to revoke refugee status where there is evidence that a person has been falsely admitted.’
Abraha did not respond to repeated requests for comment.
