PUTRAJAYA: A passport forgery syndicate believed to have helped foreign workers who failed medical screenings obtain seemingly legitimate travel documents has been busted.
Immigration Department director-general Datuk Zakaria Shaaban said two Bangladeshi men, believed to be key figures in the syndicate, were arrested during a special operation in Kuala Lumpur on Wednesday.
The operation followed the arrest of three Indonesian men on Aug 5 over passport forgery and alteration activities.
Among the items seized were up to 2,000 incomplete fake passport booklets, three mobile phones, fake entry security stamps and a printer.
Authorities also found RM200,000 in an e-wallet account believed to be proceeds from the illegal activity.
Zakaria said the syndicate offered its services to foreign workers who had failed or were deemed ineligible for mandatory Foreign Workers’ Medical Examination Monitoring Agency screenings.
“Passports were forged or altered to enable them to be used by other people during the medical screening process.
“We believe there may still be syndicates carrying out similar activities and intelligence operations will continue,” he told a press conference here yesterday.
Zakaria said the syndicate would charge RM200 to RM300 per passport and also produced fake endorsements to create seemingly valid travel records.
On another matter, he said the maximum 10-year validity period for the Malaysian international passport would continue as usual, as implemented on July 1.
He said the department would instead discontinue the additional six months previously granted to some applicants.
The additional period was introduced to ensure Malaysians did not lose the remaining validity on their previous passports.
“Our intention was to help Malaysians,” he said, adding that free replacement passports would be offered to those already issued with a 10-year-and-six-month validity.
The issue, he said, involved the systems used by certain airlines with the department having received feedback from two carriers.
He said some airlines could process passports valid beyond 10 years without problems while check-in could take longer with others.
Zakaria stressed that foreign countries continued to accept Malaysian passports exceeding 10 years in validity.
The department is also open to an audit of the 10-year passport implementation, said Zakaria, adding that due diligence had been conducted and the matter referred to the International Civil Aviation Organisation before implementation.
Separately, Zakaria said there had been no new arrests linked to Ops Crack, with the latest involving three Immigration officers detained about two weeks ago.
Efforts are continuing to track Temporary Employment Visit Pass (PLKS) holders linked to illegal approvals, with several raids uncovering discrepancies in addresses and employer details.
“When we went to the locations, the premises were different from those stated in the PLKS.
“The employer details were also different. This means they used someone else’s address. The address was also fake,” he said.
Under Ops Crack, launched by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission with the Immigration Department on July 28, a total of 1,306 illegally approved passes nationwide were detected.
