According to a BBC report, immigration agents from the Home Office raided several addresses in London on October 6, resulting in the arrests of three people. Two of them are accused of committing various immigration-related offenses, including fraud; the third individual is suspected of being in the UK illegally.

The Home Office said that enforcement officials also seized various items, including mobile phones and a large amount of cash.

The latest arrests might directly be linked to two previous arrests as part of this investigation, which took place in May; authorities are yet to comment on whether these two cases involved a separate group or were part of the same organization.

Asylum fraud carries a prison sentence of up to 10 years in Britain.

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Thousand of euros for 'gay' claims

The regional lead for Home Office criminal investigations, Chris Foster, said the arrests had close ties with an LGBT organization in Whitechapel, east London; there was also alleged links to a similar group in the city of Worcester in the East Midlands — close to the Welsh border.

Investigators said they had acted on intelligence showing that the group — which is directly affiliated with gay members and advocates of the local Bangladeshi community — allegedly colluded with the suspected fraud network to provide fake evidence that dozens of asylum applicants were gay.

The network reportedly charged between 1,200 to 5,300 euros for their unlawful services.

Foster said that the fraudulent material included letters of support, staged photographs designed to imply that Bangladeshi asylum seekers were gay and further fake documentation.

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According to the LGBT platform LGBTQnation, the asylum applicants were also taught to share false backstories about their lives in order to convince officials that they genuinely were gay.

The particular group under investigation from east London did not have any comment about the investigation on its website; it also didn't have a phone number to contact for comment. Its latest social media posts date back to 2019 — two years after its founding.

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Over 100 suspected cases

The Home Office said that it is now reviewing more than 100 cases that might be linked to the activities of the gang.

Immigration experts at the Home Office reportedly spent months looking into the group's alleged illegal activities and preparing the raids, according to Foster.

The BBC already published its findings in an investigative report back in April.

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Home Secretary: Scheme 'beyond contempt'

The LGBT advocacy group meanwhile had already previously been on the radar of British authorities, with the BBC citing that immigration judges had identified documentation issued by the group, which appeared unreliable — including at least one case in which it was evident to officials that a photograph submitted as alleged proof of an applicant's homosexuality had clearly been staged.

The Home Office added that the LGBT organization also had provided fake evidence in several cases, in which asylum seekers had been denied their requests in the first instance.

Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood commented that those partaking in the fraudulent scheme were "beneath contempt" and that they "undermine[d] genuine asylum seekers."

"To the gangs profiting from this disgraceful fraud: you will be prosecuted, stripped of your dirty money and shut down," she added.

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Genuine LGBT asylum seekers face many hardships

Despite these current headlines, it has to be pointed out that genuine asylum seekers who come to the UK — or other Western countries — on account of being persecuted at home because of their sexuality, can face serious challenges before, during and — oftentimes after their migratory journeys.

The British charity LGBTMigration wrote to InfoMigrants to stress the fact that the latest development in the UK reflects "an isolated action" and that "[a]lmost 70 countries criminalize same-sex relations, some with the death penalty."

"The UK government itself recognises that in Bangladesh same-sex sexual activity between men is criminalized, which is used to arrest, harass and extort individuals based on their sexual orientation, and that in the country in general, LGBT people are likely to face a real risk of persecution or serious harm."

While condemning the fraudulent activities alleged to have been carried out by the organization under investigation, a spokesperson for LGBTMigration said the group also " strongly condemn[ed] this government's decision to stage a small and isolated yet widely broadcast enforcement action ... around a case that doesn't reflect the difficult reality for the overwhelming majority of people who are fleeing persecution because of their sexual orientation or gender identity."

The group added that according to official UK government data, "only around two percent of all asylum claims [in Britain] included sexual orientation as a reason for needing protection."

Furthermore in the view of LGBTMigration, the latest press releases by the Home Office about the arrest contain "highly inflammatory rhetoric" about migrants with sexual and gender identities that would automatically result in persecution in their countries of origin.