Swedish man jailed for helping Syrian pair try to sneak through Changi Airport with fake passports

SINGAPORE — A 27-year-old Swedish man, of Syrian background, jumped at the chance to help his older brother escape from war-torn Syria.

In return, Suliman Karim was required to help facilitate the transit of two other Syrian nationals through Changi Airport by providing them with boarding passes for flights for which Karim had checked in using his own Swedish passport.

However, the plans — arranged by an intermediary back in Sweden — were unravelled by an Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) officer, and all three men were prevented from boarding their respective flights out of Singapore.

On Wednesday (June 26), Karim was sentenced in the State Courts to four months’ imprisonment after he pleaded guilty to one charge of a criminal conspiracy for another person to impersonate him.

Two other similar charges were taken into consideration. Karim’s sentence was backdated to March 30 this year, the date of his remand.

LOVE FOR HIS BROTHER

Deputy Public Prosecutor Victoria Ting told the court that prior to being caught, Karim had entered Singapore on two other occasions to carry out the instructions of a man he had met in Sweden last year.

Ms Ting did not elaborate on what these earlier instructions were, or when the previous occasions were, but she said that Karim had been introduced to an individual known only as Abu Jihad by another Swedish national, Sameer Sharab.

In his mitigation plea, defence lawyer Eric Tin said Karim had moved from Syria to Sweden with his mother in 2007 but his older brother had remained in Syria.

Syria has been engulfed in an ongoing civil war since 2011. Mr Tin said that Karim’s mother was getting worried for his brother’s safety.

A solution presented itself when Karim told Abu Jihad about his brother’s plight when they met.

Sometime later, Abu Jihad told Karim that he could get his brother out of Syria for free, but he needed some “favours” to be carried out in Singapore in return.

Abu Jihad promised that he would arrange for Karim's flight tickets and lodgings in Singapore. All Karim needed to do was to show up in Stockholm with his passport so that he could take a photo of it.

Karim arrived in Singapore from Sweden for the third time on March 25 this year, when he stayed in an unnamed hotel until the morning of March 28.

SNEAKY HANDOVER

That morning, Karim received not only his own flight booking details for his journey back to Sweden, but he also received the flight details for two Syrians, Omar Mohammad Hussein and Sewar Mirza Abdalla. The pair admitted Abu Jihad had been paid US$5,000 (S$6,771) to arrange their transportation out of Syria.

One ticket was for Hussein to fly to Stockholm, while the other was for Abdalla to fly to Berlin, Germany.

Both tickets were in Karim’s name.

According to the ICA, Abdalla got in touch with Abu Jihad while he was in Syria in February this year, after he found that the latter was in the business of assisting Syrians leave their country to gain entry into Europe.

As the 34-year-old wanted to seek medical treatment in Germany, Abu Jihad told him that he could make it happen for a fee of US$5,000.

Abdalla agreed and was first instructed to fly to Beirut, Lebanon, on Feb 4 with his own Syrian passport.

Two days later, he was given a second set of instructions to fly to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, where he stayed at a hotel arranged by Abu Jihad.

The ICA said that on March 28, an associate of Abu Jihad handed a counterfeit Greek passport to Abdalla which had his photograph affixed to it, though Ms Ting said that it had Karim’s name on it.

A final set of instructions was then given to Abdalla to fly to Singapore on the same day to begin his final flight to Berlin.

When he arrived in Singapore, he was told to meet up with Karim, and to use his counterfeit passport for the last leg of his journey.

Ms Ting said Karim had entered Changi Airport’s Terminal 2 that day at about 6pm, following Abu Jihad’s instructions, and used his passport to check in for both flights and printed the boarding passes.

He then went to the transit area, and with the boarding passes in hand, Karim arranged for Abdalla to meet him in one of the airport’s toilets.

Ms Ting said that Karim had placed the boarding pass for Abdalla’s flight on a basin when no one was looking and taught him how to read it, and identify the flight number and so forth.

Abdalla was caught by the ICA when he presented the boarding pass, along with the counterfeit passport to a SATS security officer.

Details for Hussein were not read out in court, but court documents mentioned that a counterfeit Belgian passport was also recovered.

In pleading for a lighter sentence for Karim, Mr Tin said that his client’s role was limited to collecting and handing the boarding passes to Hussein and Abdalla.

“There is nothing sophisticated or complicated in what he did,” said Mr Tin.

He added that Karim is not a member of any transnational migrant syndicate, nor were there any terrorism elements in this case.

His client, he said, was neither well off nor highly-educated, so he did not think through carefully the consequences of his actions.

“Mr Karim only wanted to help his brother out of Syria to reunite with their family in Sweden. Blood is thicker than water.”

Karim could have been punished with imprisonment for up to five years and fined, or received both a fine and a jail term.

Abdalla was convicted on June 14 for the possession of a counterfeit passport and was sentenced to eight months’ imprisonment.

As directed by the Attorney-General’s Chambers, Hussein was served a letter of warning on April 23 and his charged was withdrawn on the same day.