A Syrian man has revealed how he avoided putting his life on the line to escape to Europe by taking a 'five-star' route.

Tareq, 26, from Damascus, paid 3,000 Euro (£2,175), significantly more than the £500 many refugees pay traffickers to cross the Mediterranean sea, to arrive safely in the EU.

Instead of weeks of hardship and grave risks that most refugees face in their attempts to leave war-torn Syria, Tareq travelled from Dubai to Sweden in under a month.

Two worlds: Tareq, 26, from Syria (not pictured) had a 'five star' experience as the travelled via Dubai to Europe, in stark contrast to the perilous journey made by many thousand refugee families

Long way: Tareq travelled from Damascus in Syria to Dubai via Turkey and Greece to Sweden

Tareq's relatively cushty journey to his new life in Scandinavia was made possible thanks to a global network of human traffickers - and his family's financial support.

Migrants and refugees typically pay 700 euros (£505) for the sea crossing to Europe, a fee that buys them space on a packed, often unseaworthy boat run by the traffickers.

Tareq, however, bought a £2,175 'five star travel package', funded by his family in Damascus to get him safe and dry to the EU, before continuing his journey to Boliden, northern Sweden.

His family also spent an additional 'many thousands more' for other expenses such as fake identity documents to ensure that he was able to get to Sweden, which gives automatic residency to Syrian refugees.

While the price was high, he arrived safely - unlike the more than 2,500 people who have died so far this year trying to cross the sea from North Africa to Italy, or from Turkey to the Greek islands.

Bought and paid for: Tareq, 26, from Damascus, paid £2,175 for his 'travel package', some four times what most refugees pay to cross the Mediterranean on a packed, often unseaworthy boat run by the traffickers

Central Damascus has escaped the worst of the Syrian civil war but young men still face being called up. Even if they don't have to fight, jobs are scarce in the shattered economy.

'I found myself having to choose between living on handouts from my family or taking a risk, hoping that once you cross the sea, you will have a chance for a better life,' Tareq, who does not wish for his last name to be published, said.

For 18 months the marketing graduate scanned head-hunters' websites and attended countless interviews without success.

Then he went to the United Arab Emirates on a business visa in 2012, early in the Syrian conflict, to join a venture run by relatives.

He was one of thousands of Syrians, and Palestinians with Syrian documents, who have joined family members and friends already resident in the UAE during the war. But the enterprise faltered and Tareq's efforts to find work in Lebanon and Algeria also failed. And so his thoughts turned to Europe.

One day last year, he packed a pair of blue jeans, his mobile phone and laptop, and joined his many compatriots hoping to find sanctuary in the European Union.

The number of refugees and migrants from the Middle East, Asia and Africa making the crossing to Europe has passed 300,000 this year, the U.N. refugee agency UNHCR has said, up from 219,000 in the whole of 2014.

However, few can afford to travel the way Tareq did. Having failed to dissuade him from leaving, Tareq's family decided to cover his travel costs to what he described as the migrants' dream destination - Sweden.

'We did some research and found that if you pay a little more, you can travel five-star,' said Tareq's mother, Rema, who has remained in the Middle East. 'We wanted to be sure that even his toe would not get wet.'

The journey of others: Syrian refugees arrive aboard a dinghy after risking their lives to cross the narrow sea from Turkey, on the island of Lesbos, Greece, on Monday

Tareq's journey from Dubai began with a flight to Turkey, which Syrians can visit with few bureaucratic hurdles. In Istanbul, fellow Syrians put him in touch with the traffickers.

After a week at a local hotel, Tareq flew to the coastal city of Izmir where he boarded a small but comfortable boat for the short voyage to the Greek island of Rhodes.

Most migrants follow this route packed into inflatable dinghies which easily capsize. But Tareq's more substantial boat carried just a handful of passengers, and only for the last stretch did they transfer to a dinghy.

Tareq's main worry was being stopped by Greek coastguards. 'Luckily, nothing of that sort materialised and within a few hours, we were close enough to the Rhodes shore for the captain to put us on a rubber boat that dropped us on the beach,' he said.

Following the traffickers' instructions, he took a taxi to the nearest police station to register as a refugee. There, he was detained and given two nights' shelter before being freed on condition he would not leave the island.

Disregarding this, Tareq linked up with smugglers who arranged his onward journey to Athens on the Greek mainland.

For an extra 4,000 euros, wired to Tareq by his family to his north Athens hotel, a fake French passport and a Slovak ID card were arranged to help him board a flight to France.

Once there, Tareq could reach Sweden unhindered, travelling through Europe's Schengen area, where border controls are no longer routinely made.

Sweden has a long tradition of welcoming refugees. Paperwork can be minimal and arrivals are given a medical test before being moved on to temporary homes. Tareq was one of 81,000 people who sought asylum there last year, second in Europe only to Germany, with Syrians making up the biggest group.

After a tranquil night at his new home in Boliden, Tareq applied for permanent residency.