Priti Patel accuses church of helping asylum seekers ‘game the system’ by converting to Christianity

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The Church of England was today accused of aiding asylum seekers to ‘game’ the immigration system by helping hundreds to convert from Islam and ‘pray to stay’ in the UK as it emerged people smugglers are using Instagram to urge migrants to follow Jesus to help them gain British citizenship. 

Emad Al Swealmeen lost his first bid to stay in Britain in 2014 but appealed again in 2017 after he worshipped at Liverpool Cathedral and his case was still outstanding when he blew himself up in a taxi on Sunday.

He was baptised and confirmed having apparently spoken ‘endlessly and passionately about Jesus’, but members of the city’s largest Anglican church admitted they ‘lost contact’ with him within months of the ceremony. He was one of around 200 asylum seekers to adopt the faith there over a four-year period.

A clergyman at Liverpool Cathedral previously raised concerns about asylum seekers cynically posing as Christians to boost their chances of being awarded refugee status. Rev Mohammad Eghtedarian admitted in 2016 that ‘plenty of people’ were lying about their intentions after it emerged that the Church of England had christened hundreds of asylum seekers under a scheme dubbed ‘pray to stay’. 

He said: ‘There are many people abusing the system… I’m not ashamed of saying that. But is it the person’s fault or the system’s fault? And who are they deceiving? The Home Office, me as a pastor, or God?’  

MPs are to demand a ­formal Parliamentary probe into whether fake Christian converts are duping the Church of England to avoid being deported back to strict Muslim countries they came from. 

It came as new statistics revealed that between January 2020 and June this year, 29% of all migrants arriving by boat say they are from Iran and 20% say they are from Iraq. 91% of all migrants came from just 10 countries – including Afghanistan, Iran, Syria, Iraq, Sudan, Eritrea and Yemen. These are also nations named in the top 20 countries where Christians are the most persecuted for following Jesus. 

Priti Patel said last night that Al Swealmeen, who changed his name to Enzo Almeni shortly after finding Jesus, exploited the UK’s asylum ‘merry-go-round’ while a Home Office source said changing from Islam to Christianity is now ‘standard practice’ among asylum seekers ‘to game the asylum system’. 

Pledging to overhaul the asylum system, Home Secretary Miss Patel declared last night: ‘The case in Liverpool was a complete reflection of how dysfunctional, how broken, the system has been in the past, and why I want to bring changes forward.

‘It’s a complete merry-go-round and it’s been exploited by a whole professional legal services industry which has based itself on rights of appeal, going to the courts day in day out on legal aid at the expense of the taxpayers.’

Today it emerged that people traffickers have used social media sites such as Instagram to advertise crossings from France to the UK – and urge customers to consider conversion to Christianity to bolster their cases. Because the largest number of UK asylum seekers come from Muslim countries, they can also argue that their new faith would put their lives at risk if they returned to the home country.

One such advert, in Arabic, has a picture of Jesus and says finding God will lead to more successful asylum claims ‘in the shortest possible time with the lowest cost’.  

The Home Office has previously said converting to Christianity does not automatically result in a successful asylum claim. The Church of England has said baptism is ‘open to all’ and that it is up to the Government to vet asylum seekers, not them.

But Sam Ashworth-Hayes, of the counter-extremist Henry Jackson Society, said: ‘We know that people are willing to lie to win asylum up to and including faking religious conversions. This is incentivised by the asylum system, which does not do enough to root out fakes.’

Malcolm Hitchcott, who with his wife Elizabeth took in Almeni for almost a year and supported his conversion to Christianity, was also a lay preacher at Liverpool Cathedral who has previously been ‘forthright’ in his views that ‘some Iranians might pretend to have found Jesus in order to support a false claim for asylum’. 

But he believed Almeni was genuine and would ‘talk endlessly and passionately about Jesus’ and said he and his wife had loved him.

Evidence he gave to the Home Office in other asylum cases said that ‘the fact that some people might seek to abuse the trust of the Church has made him scrutinise the behaviour of the Iranian worshippers’, admitting that he would look out for un-Christian behaviour  such as swearing and sexual language.

A report said:  ‘He watches how they behave outside of formal services and meetings, and if this is found to be incongruous with their claim to be Christians, Lt Col Hitchcott would not support their asylum claims.

‘He gave the example of one man whose demeanour at meetings was markedly different from that outside; whilst quiet and respectful in company he had been overheard in the men’s bathroom using overtly sexual language and swearing.’

Mr Hitchcott mentioned the same issue during another appeal two years later.

Documents relating to the case show that he said: ‘I am aware that there are some asylum seekers who attend church with the sole purpose of advancing their asylum claims. However, their motives are usually easily exposed when their lifestyle and their professed faith are at odds with one another.’

The Church of England is facing questions over asylum seekers such as the Liverpool bomber lying about converting to Christianity so they could be awarded refugee status. 

Poppy Day bomber Emad Al Swealmeen was baptised in 2015 at Liverpool Cathedral and went on to be confirmed in 2017 after his claim for asylum was rejected in 2014. But the cathedral ‘lost contact’ with him the following year – with the bishop who carried out his confirmation service saying yesterday he had ‘no specific recollection’ of Al Swealmeen.

It emerged yesterday that Al Swealmeen was baptised as a Christian at Liverpool’s Anglican cathedral in 2015, one of around 200 asylum seekers to adopt the faith there over a four-year period.

It is understood this did not play a role in his asylum claims. But conversions are ‘standard practice’ among some asylum seekers, in particular those from Iran and Iraq, who seek to ‘game the system’, Home Office sources said. 

A counter-extremism think-tank last night called for an investigation into the ‘Liverpool Cathedral convert cluster’.

Rev Mohammad Eghtedarian said in 2016: ‘People are desperate for a better life and sometimes they will lie for it – that’s understandable.

‘There are many people abusing the system… I’m not ashamed of saying that. But is it the person’s fault or the system’s fault? And who are they deceiving? The Home Office, me as a pastor, or God?’

The previous year a lay minister at the cathedral – who would later take in Al Swealmeen – also warned that some asylum seekers ‘attend church with the sole purpose of advancing their asylum claims’. 

At the time of Al-Swealmeen’s baptism, Liverpool Cathedral was in the midst of a successful drive to both boost its congregation and embrace prospective converts.

More than 130 new converts of Iranian origin alone were baptised, with a total of 200 asylum seekers converting there between 2012 and 2016.

Liverpool was then a dispersal centre for asylum seekers, with volunteers helping to mentor new arrivals and help them access charity facilities and food banks.

In 2016 the Very Rev Peter Wilcox, then Dean of Liverpool and now Bishop of Sheffield, admitted some had ‘mixed motives’, adding: ‘Once you are a baptised Christian it is really not conceivable that you would be deported to a Muslim country.’ At the end of that year, Church Commissioners agreed £1million of funding to roll out the Anglican cathedral’s ‘multiplying congregations’ scheme across the diocese. And Liverpool Cathedral’s weekly average aggregate attendance had also risen to 702, from 438 in 2013.

Insiders stressed that the two-year ‘examination process’ of Christian conversion was ‘rigorous’ and designed to weed out opportunists.

Those applying for asylum go on to be challenged ‘strongly’ on their faith by the Home Office to check it is genuine. Al Swealmeen completed the evangelical Alpha course on Christianity at Liverpool Cathedral and after his conversion is said to have talked passionately about Jesus.

Retired Lieutenant Colonel Malcolm Hitchcott, 77, who took in Al Swealmeen after he converted, said: ‘When he came to live with us it was a very good opportunity to give him a genuine spiritual assessment.’

Al-Swealmeen – who weeks later changed his name by deed poll to Enzo Almeni – was ‘very well-founded in the scriptures’, prayed for at least half an hour a day and attended the Sunday service each week at the cathedral, he added.

The current Dean of Liverpool Cathedral last night suggested Al Swealmeen’s faith had been genuine, saying two years was a ‘long time’ to attend church for asylum reasons alone. The Very Rev Sue Jones added: ‘We can’t have responsibility for everyone. What we offer here is a safe space for asylum seekers.’

Bishop Cyril Ashton, who conducted Al Swealmeen’s confirmation service, said: ‘The church takes confirmation seriously… It seems that, sadly, the bomber chose a different path for his life.’

The cathedral is being treated as a potential target by counter-terror police. Its Remembrance Day service was taking place a mile from Liverpool Women’s Hospital at 11am on Sunday.

He is not the first Christian convert to launch a terror attack after being refused asylum. Khairi Saadallah, who killed three men in a rampage in a Reading park in June last year, converted to Christianity more than a year before the attack. He twice failed to win asylum in 2012.

Al Swealmeen is understood to have moved legally to the UK in 2014 from Dubai, where he spent his teenage years after allegedly being abused by his Syrian father.

Later that year his initial asylum application was turned down. It is understood his claim was ‘not compliant’ with Home Office rules. Al Swealmeen, who changed his name to Enzo Almeni after becoming a Christian, made a fresh asylum application in 2017 but this was rejected two years later.

His legal challenges were still under way when he died in the failed bomb attack.

More than 1,000 migrants are thought to have crossed to Britain in small boats yesterday. Traffickers were seen leading hopefuls carrying dinghies to the water at first light without a French patrol in sight.

Hundreds began arriving on the Kent coast from 8am, with boatloads turning up all day and into the evening.

With investigators yet to find any evidence that the Liverpool Women’s Hospital bomber had terror links:

One theory is that frustration over his asylum battle resulted in Al Swealmeen having a mental health crisis; But sources said no one raised the alarm about the 32-year-old’s behaviour; Detectives have determined that he did not use triacetone triperoxide, an explosive known as ‘Mother of Satan’; Friends revealed the would-be pizza chef was so car mad that he nicknamed himself ‘GT’ – for ‘gran turismo’ – and was obsessed with the singer Johnny Cash; Police released without charge four men in their 20s who were arrested under terrorism laws following Sunday’s attack. 

The revelations about how Al Swealmeen was able to remain in the UK raise serious concerns over flaws in the asylum process that can undermine national security.

A former minister said the case strengthened the Government’s argument for tearing up the Human Rights Act to make it easier to deport failed asylum seekers.

‘This looks like an awful example of what happens when bogus asylum seekers are not sent back and their minds turn to terror,’ said Tory MP Sir John Hayes.

‘Who knows what other horrors we are importing with this broken system?’

He said the Act allowed ‘people, aided and abetted by fat cat legal aid lawyers and bleeding heart liberals to delay proceedings with spurious claims for years’.

Migration Watch UK, which campaigns for tougher border controls, said the case could be the ‘tip of the iceberg’. Alp Mehmet, the group’s chairman, added: ‘It points to the dysfunctional depths into which our shattered asylum system has sunk. 

‘Why this person was not removed or detained having been denied asylum is utterly baffling. We need to know.’

David Videcette, a former 7/7 counter-terror detective at Scotland Yard, said it was time for ‘grown-up conversations’ about the potential threat from failed asylum seekers. 

‘There are repeated examples across Europe of terrorists infiltrating migrant flows,’ he said. ‘Then, when found out, after exhausting the asylum appeals system, they resort to type and attack their host country at that point.

‘There has to be a better system for dealing with thousands of unknown people, with no documents, claiming they are someone or something they are not.’

Al Swealmeen is understood to have moved legally to the UK in 2014 from Dubai, where he spent his teenage years after allegedly being abused by his Syrian father.

Later that year his initial asylum application was turned down. It is understood his claim was ‘not compliant’ with Home Office rules. 

But he lodged a succession of appeals against the ministry’s decisions to deny him refugee status.

In 2015 he was baptised as a Christian at Liverpool’s Anglican cathedral, one of around 200 asylum seekers to adopt the faith there over a four-year period.

Counter-terror police are now treating the cathedral as a potential target. 

It was hosting a Remembrance Day service when Al Swealmeen’s bomb partially detonated a mile away in a minicab outside the maternity hospital.

His legal challenges were still under way when he died in the failed bomb attack. It is understood Al Swealmeen’s adoption of Christianity did not play a role in his asylum claims. 

But conversions are ‘standard practice’ among some asylum seekers, in particular those from Iran and Iraq, who seek to ‘game the system’ to avoid removal from the UK, sources said. 

Al Swealmeen, who changed his name to Enzo Almeni after becoming a Christian, made a fresh asylum application in 2017 but this was rejected two years later.

Forensic officers yesterday continued the delicate task of searching the ‘bomb factory’ in Rutland Avenue, Liverpool, which Al Swealmeen rented in apparent preparation for the attack. 

North-west counter-terror chief Russ Jackson said the investigation was moving ‘at a fast pace’.

Miss Patel has pledged the biggest shake-up of immigration laws in a generation. Her plans include strict limits on the types of asylum appeals that applicants can use.

Additional reporting: Liz Hull, Emine Sinmaz and Rebecca Camber