Características del grupo

From a financial angle, a partial explanation can be presented for the lack of a range of criminal activities. Both the hierarchical model and the network model assume that Chinese human smuggling is motivated by financial drivers. This was certainly the case with all defendants.27 The smugglers talk about profits and losses, owing each other money and receiving payments. In the thousands of tapped telephone conversations, no motive based on idealism was ever discussed. One lawyer attempted to convince the appeal court that his client had acted out of Christian charity. However, this did not prevent the smuggler to turn his human smuggling operation into a profit-making business. In one tapped telephone con- versation, he enthusiastically told a friend in China that he had earned over 100,000 euros the previous year (case 28).

The relationship that the smugglers in the research group had with their migrants was therefore financially motivated. In recent years, various studies have shown that human smuggling from China to the West is very expensive. The smuggling fee for passage from China to the US can vary between USD 30,000 and USD 60,000 (Kyle & Liang, 2001: 20; Morse, 2001; Wang, 2001: 350). Passage to Europe is somewhat cheaper at around USD 30,000 on average (Godfroid & Vinckx, 1999: 37, 63, 233; Vogels et al., 1999: 123). The Dutch court files also confirm that smuggling involves such high fees. The highest smuggling

27. Most smuggled people will also have been motivated by financial drivers, as the section on recruiters suggests. Nevertheless, the empirical source material on this subject is somewhat scanty to substantiate any conclusions.

fee recorded for the journey from China to the Netherlands was 30,000 euros (case 98) and the lowest was 15,000 euros (case 42). But how does a migrant pay such a large amount?

The prevailing (media) image is that a smuggled person plunges himself into debt to the smuggler. In that way the smuggled person is obliged to pay off his debt to the smuggler at a huge interest rate over a period of several years. Due to strict sanctions, these payment obligations are said to have far-reaching conse- quences. Some Chinese men are forced to become involved in crime (robbery, extortion), while women can end up in prostitution.

However, this is not an accurate reflection of the Dutch situation. The previ- ous sections showed that smugglers did not exploit their clientele. Furthermore, this widespread assumption of debt bondage leaves little scope for the possibility of other financial arrangements. One common alternative method is ‘prefinanc- ing’. In line with the accepted views on smuggling, it is true that a smuggled per- son has to work hard for years to pay the sum of some tens of thousands of US dollars. There is, however, one crucial difference. That debt is often not paid to the smuggler or smuggling network, but to the smuggled person’s own family/ relatives or circle of friends. The money is raised in different ways. Some do this by borrowing from family. In such cases, the next of kin and the extended family are apparently financially secure enough to finance the smuggling. It is also cus- tomary for friends, neighbors or even local loan sharks to lend money at a certain interest rate. Alternatively, migrants are known to sell their houses or land. The important thing is the money necessary for the smuggling operation is somehow available before the journey commences. When the money should be transferred from migrant to smuggler is a delicate issue. How can the person being smug- gled be sure that after payment he will actually be taken to the target country? And conversely, how can the smuggler be sure that after arrival in the target coun- try the smuggled person will not run off, but will hand over the money owed?

Apparently, the migrant has a strong bargaining position. As a token of good- will, he will pay about 10 percent of the total sum in advance. Family, relatives or friends see to the settlement of the remainder only after the migrant has arrived at his destination. Following a successful journey, the smuggled person contacts them by telephone and informs them that he has reached the country of destina- tion safe and sound, and that the smugglers can be paid. A slight variation on this procedure is when the smuggled person telephones his guarantors after success- ful completion of each part of the journey, for instance from China to Russia, from Russia to Germany, from Germany to the Netherlands, etc. Another method is to place the amount due in the hands of a trusted third party. The smuggler is thereby guaranteed that the sum is real and the smuggled person can be sure the money will be kept safe during the journey.28

28. The prefinancing method is not specifically tied to Chinese nationals. Other nationalities also use this method. Investigations into the smuggling of Iraqis suggest that the preferred method of payment is to use a trusted third party, who is often a man of some standing in the local com- munity and involved in underground banking (personal observation based on the analysis of several Dutch investigations on the smuggling of migrants from Iraq).

Payment of the smuggling fee usually takes place in China, but can also take place in the country of destination. In the latter instance, the transfer is often done by relatives or friends who migrated previously and are willing to act as guarantor for the migrant. Smuggled people are usually kept in safe houses until payment is made, which can take anywhere from a day to several weeks. During this time, the illegal migrants are restricted in their freedom of movement. They know beforehand that this is part of the procedure. According to Chin’s research, in some cases a contract is signed before the journey starts stating, among other things, that people can be held hostage (Chin, 1997: 192, 193).

Information from abroad suggests that the prefinancing method is fre- quently used. Wang estimates that the majority of the Chinese who enter the US illegally have their friends and relatives pay the smuggling fee (Wang, 1996: 53- 56). Chin’s field investigation carried out in the mid-nineties corroborates this (Chin, 1997: 174-179). The use of prefinancing is quite appealing to smuggling groups. Once the job is done, they get paid. They do not have to spend years col- lecting small monthly payments. It can therefore be argued that the menacing image of a powerful organization that skims off the wages of hundreds of illegal immigrants every week is unfounded. It would be an enormous task for smug- gling groups that smuggle a few hundred migrants a year to keep track of all their clients. They would have to monitor their place of residence and work, their income and make sure that they make their payments. This would not only be very labor-intensive, but maintaining such a relationship with the illegal migrant would also increase the risk of detection by the investigating authorities. Further- more, the smuggling group has to invest considerably in the smuggling opera- tion (buying travel documents, arranging transport, accommodation, etc.) and does not wish to wait for years for this investment to pay off (Chin, 1997: 194).

It is not known what percentage of smuggled people use the prefinancing method in the Netherlands. It is likely that confirming the use of this method would be disadvantageous for some migrants. For example, the (person who claims to be an) unaccompanied underage asylum seeker can hardly declare that family members in China raised the fee for him or her.29 They are therefore unlikely to talk about the method of payment. However, the source material is also largely to blame for lack of knowledge about financing methods. During police investigations, smuggled people are often only asked how much they had to pay, not how and when payment was made. Still, in those cases in which the how and when questions were asked, prefinancing was mentioned very fre- quently. It is therefore likely that a high percentage of smuggled people use the prefinancing method.

29. In 1999 the percentage of underage asylum seekers reached 68% (amounting to 792 people) of the total number of applications for asylum by Chinese nationals (figures from the Immigration and Naturalization Service). In 2000 the figure was even slightly higher at 69% (942 people).