Govt. questioned over foreign nationals in SL

By Ashwin Hemmathagama – Our Lobby Correspondent

The Government has witnessed an increase of foreign immigrants to Sri Lanka in the last three years, with foreign tourists violating visa conditions, but action has been taken to deport them, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said yesterday. 

According to Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, there could be many reasons for this increase of foreign immigrants. However, using an international database updated regularly by the State intelligence services and the United Nations, Department of Immigration and Emigration has prevented blacklisted people from entering the country at all times.

“There has been no move to render the Immigration and Emigration Intelligence Sections powerless. Instead, we have expanded them. We have combined the Observations Unit of the Department of Immigration and Emigration and the Immigration and Emigration Intelligence unit in 2018, to create a single body to observe and apprehend the persons violating the provisions of the Immigration and Emigration Act. The facility comprises Deputy Controller of Immigration and Emigration, Assistant Controller, and staff of senior and junior officers. It has the facilities to coordinate with police and other security agencies, as per the needs arising. Action has been taken to apprehend the overstaying foreigners and to deport them,” the Prime Minister confirmed to Parliament.

However, Opposition lawmaker Dullas Alahapperuma held the number of overstaying foreign visitors has reached 9,786 by the end of April, and there are 1670 asylum seekers in the country.

“Half of those overstaying foreigners have come from countries that have been affected by the IS problem. Andrew Huskings, a BBC journalist in his book Empire of Fear, has marked these countries. This is a dangerous threat. There is a map in his book that shows the spread of IS empire. There are Chinese and Indian projects operating here, and they have their nationals working in those projects. But in addition to them, there are 60 Lebanese, over 20 from Yemen, more than 53 from Palestine. There are more than 24 from Sudan, and 32 from Iran. There are more than 1,500 asylum seekers in Negombo. They are there for more than five years. This is a dangerous situation. According to a newspaper article, there are around 3,000 foreigners in the country to propagate their religion,” said MP Alahapperuma. (AH)