The UN refugee agency, the UNHCR, has been rocked by allegations that corrupt officials at its Nairobi office may have extorted millions of pounds from desperate African refugees who wanted to resettle in the West.
Processing of refugee applications has ground to a halt as officials investigate claims that key employees demanded up to $2,500 per person for services that were meant to be free.
In some cases applications were allegedly falsified, leaving true refugees stuck in sweltering desert camps while those with money were flown to American and European cities to start a new life.
Some 18 Kenyan staff have been sent on unpaid leave in the last two weeks, and the UNHCR has not renewed one Italian employee's contract. Officials are being flown in from other countries as the UN struggles to re-establish the integrity of its system.
It is still not known how much money changed hands in the payments-for-papers racket. But given that more than 17,000 refugees were relocated from Kenya, mainly to the US, Canada and Australia, in the last two years alone, the sums are potentially huge.
"Everybody knows about it. You even have to bribe the guards on the gate to get into the compound," said one Rwandan refugee in Nairobi.
Four UN staff understood to possess incriminating evidence fled Kenya last autumn after receiving death threats.
The payment of bribes for papers is "more the rule than the exception," said an Ethiopian woman who translates refugee applications in Nairobi. She explained how the racket worked:
"Usually the refugees are approached by an agent after they have been waiting for a long time and are getting desperate. He says `Why don't you do what is normally done?' That's when they start talking money".
Individuals pay $3,000 and families up to $7,000 to have their cases pushed to the top of the pile. The money is sourced from relatives living in the West and is paid to a Kenyan, she said, although it is understood the "higher authority" is a white man.
Kenya is host to 205,000 refugees from nine African countries, 90 per cent of whom come from Somalia and Sudan. The majority are confined to huge UN desert camps in Kakuma and Daadab in northern Kenya.
Resettlement is supposed to be the last option for those who cannot return to their home countries, but the process is widely abused.
"Some have genuine cases and are desperate to start a new life. But others make up stories, saying they have been arrested or beaten up and their lives are in danger," said the translator.
The allegations are deeply embarrassing for the UNHCR. Its spokesman, Mr Paul Stromberg, said yesterday: "This investigation is a sweeping move to make sure the system continues to function. Human trafficking is big business now. There's a lot of money to be made."
In a cafe in Eastleigh, a rundown neighbourhood teeming with refugees, an Eritrean student named Salahabin showed his latest letter of rejection from the UNHCR.
"I have applied so many times," said the man, who fled the war in his country three years ago. "But if you don't have money nobody here can understand your problem".
