DUBAI, 2 September 2007 — Dubai officials have received more than 184,000 applications from illegal residents during the last three months. Dubai Naturalization and Residency Department (DNRD) announced that the number of illegal workers who came forward with their applications during the amnesty period from June 2 to Aug. 31, 2007, had reached 184,873 in Dubai.
“By Aug. 31, the DNRD administration has issued 121,605 outpasses and helped regularize the status of 53,268 illegal workers,” Brig. Mohammed Al-Marri, director of NRD Administration, said yesterday.
DNRD, which operates its main branch in Jumeirah as well as peripheral facilities across the emirate, has also created temporary centers to receive and process the maximum number of applications six days a week, 24 hours a day.
Al-Marri called on illegal workers to benefit from the extended amnesty period. He commended the staff members at the administration’s various facilities for their exhausting efforts during the amnesty period and for giving up their well-deserved summer holidays with their families to assist in this nationwide campaign. The director of DNRD also expressed his appreciation for the different consulates, namely the Indian and Egyptian consulates in Dubai, for their cooperation and support.
He expressed his gratitude to the Dubai police, the municipality and the Water and Electricity Authority for their on-the-ground support which has facilitated the process of receiving and processing applications during the past few months. Since the UAE Interior Ministry has extended the amnesty period, any person illegally in the UAE now has until Nov. 3 to leave. But only people who have completed the legal procedures of obtaining amnesty can benefit from this extension; no new processing will be allowed from tomorrow.
Anyone illegally in the country after Nov. 3 will be subject to the UAE legal system. Due to the unparalleled economic growth in the UAE, hundreds of thousands of migrant workers have entered the country during the last five years. But many of them were victims of unscrupulous recruitment agents.
