Summary Saudi Arabia has given 4 more months to illegal foreign workers to regularise status or return home
RIYADH (AFP) - Saudi Arabia on Tuesday extended by four more months an amnesty enabling illegal foreign workers to regularise their status or return home without prosecution.
King Abdullah has ordered "extending the time limit" of the Amnesty due to expire on Wednesday until November, the interior ministry said in a statement carried by the official SPA news agency.
English-language daily Arab News said the amnesty would now expire on November 4.
The ruler of the oil powerhouse had announced the amnesty on April 3, granting foreign workers a three-month grace period to regularise their residency or leave Saudi Arabia to avoid being jailed, fined or placed on a blacklist.
Foreign workers must also find a Saudi sponsor in order to obtain residency permits.
According to the labour ministry more than 1.5 million illegal foreign workers have come forward so far.
Of these, some 180,000 have left the kingdom in addition to more than 200,000 unregistered workers expelled at the start of the year under new regulations to stamp out illegal immigration.
Foreigners desperate to work in the country are willing to pay for sponsorship, and sponsoring expatriates has become a lucrative business for some Saudis.
But under the new rules workers can be employed only by their own sponsors.
Rules mainly impact low-paid workers, most of whom are from India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Indonesia, but with some from Yemen and Egypt as well.
They had been fearful of the campaign of arrests promised by authorities once the amnesty expires.
Human Rights Watch on Tuesday urged the kingdom to abolish its migrant worker sponsorship system and allow workers in abusive situations to easily change their jobs.
Workers "suffer multiple abuses and labour exploitation, sometimes amounting to slavery-like conditions," said HRW.
"Saudi Arabia should get serious about regularising the status of its workers and do away with an abusive labour system that forces migrants into illegal employment," said HRW s Mideast deputy director Joe Stork.
The sponsorship system "ties migrant workers residency permits to sponsoring employers, whose written consent is required for workers to change employers or leave the country," said HRW.
