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Minister of Defence and National Security Colonel (Rtd) Mohamed Nazim has said that they are trying to slow down the rate of expatriate workers entering the country.

The Defence Minister also described the exponential increase in expatriate population as a threat to the country’s national security.

“I am thinking of proposing a paper to slow down the entry of expatriate workers, within near future. Because right now, there are a large number of unregistered people in the Maldives. We really want to stop bringing more people before we can register the existing people,” Nazim said.

He said that an estimated 1200 expatriate workers enter the country per week and that the new border control system, granted gratis by the U.S. government, will help the Maldivian authorities to better screen arriving foreigners, as well as help to better maintain the relevant databases.