Hundreds of Workers Left Stranded at Airport

Some 400 people are stranded at Kuala Lumpur's international airport because of travel document irregularities and labour agents failing to meet workers whose employment in Malaysia they have arranged, the country's human rights commission said yesterday.

The crisis has been going on for more than a year but has only just come to light. Most of the stranded people - predominantly manual labourers from Pakistan, Bangladesh, India and Nepal - are waiting up to a fortnight to be collected. It is a continuous problem because as soon as some people are collected more arrive.