A statement issued on the Philippine Consulate’s website said the meeting was led by Consul General Antonio A. Morales and his Indonesian counterpart, Tri Tharyat, at the latter’s invitation.
The meeting came in the wake of reports of the seizure of 859 Philippine and Indonesian passports from the house of an unlicensed money lender in Tsuen Wan.
Last year, 250 other passports, all belonging to Filipino nationals, were also seized by the police in a raid on another illicit money lending scam allegedly run by a local Chinese couple and eight Filipinas who acted as their runners.
Both consulates face the problem of firming up guidelines on issuing new passports to their nationals who lost their documents to illegal money lenders from whom they borrowed money with interest at up to 125% a month. Hong Kong laws set the maximum interest for loans at 60%.
According to the PCG statement, both consulates “looked looked forward to their continued close partnership and cooperation to protect the rights and promote the welfare of their respective citizens, especially household services workers, in Hong Kong.”
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| Officials of Philippine and Indonesian consulates discuss measures to protect their nationals. |
