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COLOMBO - Almost 14,000 Sri Lankan migrant workers who have overstayed their visas in Saudi Arabia have turned themselves over to the authorities to be repatriated or be handed legal visas, said the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment on Wednesday.

Jun 05, Colombo: Sri Lanka Minister of Foreign Employment Promotion Dilan Perera says that around 14,000 Sri Lankans have registered so far at the Sri Lankan Embassy in Saudi Arabia to leave that country or to legalize their status during a grace period provided for the illegally staying foreigners.

Sri Lanka, out of seven countries surveyed, has seen the highest amount of remittances through informal means in 2012 followed by Indonesia.

Jun 02, Colombo: The government has made it mandatory for the Sri Lankan migrant workers to register with the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment (SLBFE).

The new Sri Lankan ambassador to the Kingdom, Vadivel Krishnamoorthy, has pledged to make his country’s embassy a model mission for quality services and maintain the dignity of the island nation.

The Saudi Arabian government has declared a period of pardon for illegal migrant workers in the country and  Sri Lankan Embassy in Saudi Arabia has taken steps to conduct a special mobile service on Monday and Tuesday for illegal migrant workers from Sri Lanka, the Information Department said.

Sixty-one Bangladeshis, who returned home Sunday after nearly four months in Sri Lankan detention camps, described their experience of spending 24 days adrift at sea on a broken-down boat, without food or water.

The Sri Lankan missions in Riyadh and Jeddah are currently working 24 hours a day, including weekends, to sort out the paperwork of over 10,000 workers by July 3, the end of the three-month grace period provided for expatriate workers to rectify their work status.