Australia's public broadcaster says people smugglers are increasingly targeting New Zealand as a destination for asylum seekers.
An investigation by the ABC's Four Corners programme has found that Iraqi national Abu Tarek is offering asylum seekers forged Bahraini passports with Australian visas for up to $NZ18,000 to fly directly to New Zealand.
In a series of meetings in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur last week, Mr Tarek was secretly filmed offering two types of Australian visa, holiday visas and transit visas for flights going on to New Zealand, to potential customers.
The ABC's Sarah Ferguson told Radio New Zealand's Checkpoint programme on Monday evening that people smugglers are targeting New Zealand as a destination for asylum seekers.
"New Zealand is coming up more and more in the discourse of people smugglers. And I know that a number of key smugglers from one of the biggest syndicates in Indonesia have actually moved their family to New Zealand," she said. "There are people smugglers, who would originally have looked at Australia as a destination, are actually now relocating to New Zealand."
