Over 300 foreigners stopped with forged work visas
Shifan also shared some details of three interesting cases involving foreigners.
By
Aishath Fareeha Abdulla
Immigration border officers have detained 341 foreigners trying to enter Maldives with forged work visas and work permits in the past eight months, the agency said on Wednesday.
Deputy Chief Immigration Officer Mohammed Shifan told a news conference on Wednesday that people are even trying to enter Maldives on tourist visas to work.
Statistics of illegal immigrants detained by Immigration were shared on Wednesday.
Thus:
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A total of 1,664 foreigners were stopped trying to enter Maldives using invalid documents
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These include 1,289 people from 85 countries who tried to enter Maldives on tourist visas
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341 people from 22 countries were stopped from entering Maldives on invalid work permits or work visas
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33 people were arrested for trying to enter Maldives using forged documents and one person was arrested for trying to enter Maldives using fake identity
Shifan said many efforts are being made to prevent foreigners from entering Maldives on tourist visas to work. Most of the 1,289 people detained on tourist visas were Bangladeshis, he said.
Detained while trying to enter Maldives on tourist visa:
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356 people from Bangladesh
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195 Sri Lankans
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162 people from India
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42 Nigerians
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35 people from Vietnam
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499 people from other countries
"Tourist visas are issued [on arrival] to everyone who comes to Maldives. Therefore, they are trying to enter Maldives on tourist visas and then find work. These are the number of people we were able to stop at the border," Shifan said.
341 people, from 22 countries, have been stopped from trying to enter Maldives with forged work visas, he said.
They include:
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205 people from Bangladesh
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38 people from India
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31 Sri Lankans
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8 Indonesians
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6 Nigerians
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54 from other countries
He also shared some details of three cases involving foreigners.
According to Shifan, four Bangladeshi nationals, who arrived here on July 3 by Vistara Airlines, tried to enter the country with duplicate Greek exit stamps on passports.
"We suspect that these people are trying to enter Maldives and go to another European country. If they enter Maldives and get a Maldivian entry stamp, it is easier to enter another country. So they are using Maldives as a transit destination," he said.
The second case Shifan shared was about a foreigner who commits crimes while married to a Maldivian.
"A Bangladeshi man named Arif Kamadari. From 2019 until his deportation, a joint operation with the police showed us that he had smuggled 23 women into prostitution," Shifan said.
Shifan said the Bangladeshi has now been deported. Other foreigners involved in the case have also been arrested and deported, he said.
Shifan also said that eight foreign nationals dealing in foreign exchange in the black market have been caught in the last eight months and six of them have been deported.
