The Chinese Embassy in Bogota, Colombia, is looking into an immigration case involving the detention of 101 Chinese nationals in two separate raids in the nearby town of Zipaquira.

 

"After getting the information on Monday night, we planned to send our embassy staff to the police station (in Zipaquira, 30 km north of Bogota) where the Chinese have been detained, but we were told to go there on Tuesday morning (local time) because the Colombian officer in charge of the case would not be available at night," an embassy staff told China Daily yesterday.

 

"One of the problems is that the Colombian police and the detained Chinese cannot communicate because of the language barrier."

 

"We are waiting to meet the 101 Chinese and help them communicate with police," the embassy staff said.

 

Acting on a tip-off, the Colombian police found the Chinese immigrants in overcrowded rooms with dirty mattresses and floors.

 

"The house was locked from outside so that they could not leave," government secretary in Zipaquira Edgar Castillo said.

 

Twenty-one of the 42 held in the first raid had entered Colombia legally. They had a 15-day tourist visa and reached Bogota on an Air France flight from Italy on March 30 and 31, said Castillo, who had checked their passports.

 

But none of the 59 detained in the second raid were carrying any documents, he said. Although none has been formally arrested, police are interrogating a Costa Rican national who visited the house where the Chinese had been staying soon after the first police raid, said Colonel Wilson Laverde, police commander of Cundinamarca.

 

The Chinese government has a clear stance on combating illegal migration in all forms and has taken effective measures to curb such activities.

 

China will accept the return of its citizens declared illegal immigrants once their identities are confirmed.

 

(China Daily April 18, 2007)