A total of 2,013 illegal immigrants have been deported from the Maldives. The decision was announced by the Controller General of Maldives Immigration Mohammad Sham'aan, during a press conference held by the Ministry of Homeland Security and Technology.
Speaking at the press conference, Sham'aan disclosed that the Maldives Immigration has deported expatriates involved in illegal business and serious criminal cases. He noted that the authority will be disclosing the details in the near future.
A special operation was launched by the Maldives Immigration and the Maldives Police Service (MPS) to track down illegal immigrants living and doing businesses in the Maldives. Adding that a total of 120 people have been arrested as part of the operation, Sham'aan reiterated that the authority would not stop the operations, until the issues of illegal immigrants are solved.
While several foreign individuals actively work in the nation, many of them are illegal immigrants. The government is making strategic efforts to tackle the issue. As such, the government aims to expand this operation across all islands nationwide within the next year and collect information about immigrants to be easily accessed in a single database. They have also started to do more thorough medical examinations of the expatriates entering to the country. The government aims to solve the issue of illegal immigrants completely within three years.