33 expatriates who were living in Thilafushi island of Kaafu atoll without valid visas have been taken into Immigration custody.

An official at Maldives Immigration revealed that said expatriates were taken into Immigration custody on Friday. A task force which is conducting operations targeting expatriates living illegally in Thilafushi, carried out a special raid operation on Friday morning.

The official said that 28 officers from Immigration and 35 officers from the Maldives Police Service (MPS) participated in the special raid.

According to the Immigration official, 257 expatriates were searched as part of the raid. Out of those, 33 expatriates who were living without valid visas were taken into Immigration custody, and 22 people were given written notices.

This comes as part of the immigration department’s ongoing efforts to seek out and take the required action against illegal migrants residing in the Maldives and engaging in illegal businesses in the Maldives.

The immigration office highlighted that their main focus at the time is to identify businesses run by illegal foreigners and take legal action against them.

Controller General of Immigration Mohamed Shamaan Waheed earlier said 4,361 illegal migrants have been deported back to their countries, so far.

Shamaan said that their target was to deport 5,000 illegal migrants residing in the Maldives and that so far, 4,361 have been sent back to their countries.

Providing an update on the work done by Maldives Immigration so far, Shamaan said that in the past 11 months, 186 raid orders were issued, and 1,237 places were inspected.

Shamaan said that among these, 70 intelligence-based targeted raid operations were conducted in collaboration with MPS.

Shamaan added that they are primarily targeting operations of illegal migrants residing in the Maldives who are involved in conducting business without any connection to Maldivians and operating independently without paying taxes.