27 expats detained in Immigration raid on Male’ food courts

Over two dozen expatriate workers were detained by Maldives Immigration on Sunday, in a raid on food courts located in Male’ City.

The raid on the food courts, located in the western harbor area, was conducted on Sunday night by the special task force set up between Immigration and police to tackle irregular migration.

According to a post on X by Immigration on Monday, the authorities raided the food courts because it was flagged for employing a high number of irregular expatriate workers.

Immigration said they questioned and inspected the documents of 88 expatriates, and detained 27 who were found in breach of immigration regulations.

The crackdown on irregular migration – launched in 2023 – has seen over 12,000 expatriates deported from the Maldives.

The authorities also launched ‘Operation Kurangi’ in May 2024, an initiative to collect the biometric data of all expatriates working in the Maldives.

Homeland Security Minister Ali Ihusan said in April that authorities were able to bring down the population of undocumented migrants from 72 percent to 38 percent over the last two years under the operation.

The third phase of ‘Operation Kurangi’, rolled out in May, focuses on the immediate identification, arrest, and deportation of undocumented expatriates and those with outstanding visa fees.