PUTRAJAYA: The Immigration Department busted a passport forgery operation led by a Bangladeshi man who operated out of a hotel in Chow Kit, Kuala Lumpur with his arrest on Thursday (July 4) morning.
Immigration director-general Datuk Ruslin Jusoh said the 24-year-old suspect was in the country on a valid student pass.
"An operations team raided the hotel room the suspect operated from and seized passport forging equipment including a laptop and printer (along with) 37 Bangladeshi passports, two Indian passports and six Indonesian passports, all suspected to be forgeries," he said in a statement on Friday (July 5).
"The syndicate would... offer forged passports to undocumented foreigners from Bangladesh, Nepal, India and Indonesia.
"It would use the passports to obtain documents from monitoring agencies and for foreign worker medical check-ups,” he said, adding that a fee of RM100 to RM150 was charged for each passport.
The suspect could churn out between 50 and 100 forgeries a day, Ruslin said.
The suspect is now being held at the Putrajaya Immigration Depot for investigation under the Immigration Act 1959/63, the Passport Act 1966 and the Immigration Regulations 1963.
In addition, a local man has been issued a notice to show up at the Immigration office to assist with investigations, Ruslin added. – Bernama
