PUTRAJAYA: Malaysia must move towards a more predictive, adaptive and future-ready immigration system to address increasingly complex global migration threats, says Home Minister Saifuddin Nasution Ismail.
He said a purely reactive approach was no longer sufficient in dealing with current immigration challenges, as threats today were no longer limited to conventional offences.
"These include organised cross-border syndicates involving document forgery, migrant smuggling, exploitation of foreign nationals and abuse of the country's immigration system. As such, I see the future of the nation's immigration framework being built on the principle of Smart, Secure and Seamless Immigration," he said.
Saifuddin said this in his speech at the 2025 Excellent Service Award ceremony of the Immigration Department here on Tuesday (May 19).
He said geopolitical conflicts, global economic uncertainty, pressure on global supply chains and uneven development between countries had created dynamic and unpredictable migration patterns.
According to him, the prolonged conflict in the Middle East had also impacted global oil prices, inflation, investor confidence and cross-border human movement.
"When a country's economy comes under pressure and life becomes increasingly uncertain, people will move in search of protection, jobs, economic opportunities and a more stable life," he said.
Citing findings by the International Organization for Migration (IOM), Saifuddin said the Asia-Pacific region had become one of the busiest migration corridors in the world. He added more than 1.6 million Myanmar nationals were recorded entering Thailand through land routes between Jan and Oct last year.
Of the total, he said 51% lacked official documentation, while about 5,000 refugees travelled via sea routes in the Bay of Bengal and Andaman Sea using organised migrant smuggling networks.
Saifuddin said migrant syndicates no longer operated conventionally, but instead used manipulated passports, identity forgery, travel document swaps at transit airports and visa abuse to evade immigration enforcement.
"Irregular migration routes today have evolved into an operational ecosystem that constantly changes according to enforcement pressure and available opportunities," he said.
