Phony Colleges Provide Cover for Terror Suspects

(United Kingdom) A disturbing report is surfacing in the UK from the TimesOnLine.

Thousands of young Pakistanis exploited a hole in Britain’s immigration defences to enrol as students at a network of sham colleges, The Times can reveal.

The gateway, opened by fraudsters who have earned millions from the scam, has allowed in hundreds of men from a region of Pakistan that is the militant heartland of al-Qaeda and the Pakistani Taleban.

Eight of the terror suspects arrested last month in Manchester and Liverpool were on the books of one college. It had three small classrooms and three teachers for the 1,797 students on its books. Another college claimed to have 150 students but secretly enrolled 1,178 and offered places to a further 1,575 overseas applicants, 906 of them in Pakistan.

Eleven colleges in London, Manchester and Bradford have been tied to three Pakistani businessman running the fraudulent scheme which reportedly has fueled a surge in student arrivals from Pakistan. Between 2002 and 2007, Pakistani nationals entering the UK grew from 8,000 to 27,000.

The Immigration Minister, Phil Woolas, said the UK Border Agency is investigating. Heh.

Companion post at The Jawa Report.