KOTA KINABALU, Dec 18 — The Immigration Department will develop the Advanced Passenger Screening System (APSS) to prohibit foreign nationals blacklisted as suspected terrorists or criminals from entering the country.

Its director-general, Datuk Alias Ahmad said Malaysia would collaborate with Singapore in developing the APSS which could stop terror and crime suspects in their track before leaving their countries as they could be detected beforehand.

“Singapore is in the process of testing the system while Malaysia is currently developing it. We will study the APSS used by Singapore in developing ours.

“Why APSS? It is aimed at filtering foreign nationals intending to fly (to Malaysia) as they can be detected even before they checked-in for boarding.

“So anyone blacklisted or suspected of being terrorists or criminals will not be allowed to fly or enter our country. We will implement the system together with Singapore,” he told reporters after attending a meeting between the Malaysian Immigration Department and Immigration & Checkpoint Authority of Singapore here today.

Alias said the APSS proposal would be presented to the government in three months’ time and if it were accepted, it would likely be implemented next year.

He said only 18 countries, all of them developed countries, had implemented the system and Malaysia would be working with them when the system is in placed.

Alias said the Immigration Department should be equipped with advanced assets to screen people’s movement as last year alone 148 million people travelled between Singapore and Malaysia through two entrances in Johor.

On the meeting, he said both countries had agreed to cooperate and share intelligence, apart from working together to detect missing or stolen passports.

Alias said the Malaysia Immigration Department would study how the Singapore e-Visa was issued abroad to see whether it could be implemented by Malaysia by enhancing it with the inclusion of biometric data. — Bernama