Filipino migrants arrested in Sabah

Filipino migrants arrested in Sabah

KUALA LUMPUR (AP): Malaysian security forces, backed by
helicopters and speedboats, swooped down on an island off Borneo
and arrested 225 people, mainly Filipino immigrants without
proper documents, a news report said on Friday.

The Gaya island, off the remote northeastern province of
Sabah, was cordoned off midnight Wednesday as authorities checked
more than 2,000 people living there, the Star newspaper said,
quoting police officials.

More than 900 families who did not have proper documents were
evicted from the island.

The island was once a popular destination for poor Filipinos
fleeing the Muslim separatist insurgency in southern Philippines.
Many of the immigrants still live in dilapidated wooden huts and
work as laborers on mainland Sabah.

Government officials estimate about 600,000 Filipinos, mostly
Muslims, live in Sabah, a state which is separated from the
insurgency-wracked Philippine provinces by a strip of water
called the Sulu Sea.