Po­lice have de­tained 15 Venezue­lan na­tion­als who al­leged­ly en­tered the coun­try il­le­gal­ly dur­ing an ear­ly morn­ing op­er­a­tion in the South­ern Di­vi­sion yes­ter­day.

A state­ment from the TTPS said the joint ex­er­cise, which took place be­tween 4 am and 8 am in the Cedar Hill Vil­lage, Princes Town dis­trict, in­volved of­fi­cers from the Im­mi­gra­tion In­ves­ti­ga­tions Unit, South, the An­ti-Kid­nap­ping Unit, the Guard and Emer­gency Branch (GEB), the In­ter-Agency Task Force, the Ca­nine Branch and CA­SU.

Po­lice said 11 males and four fe­males were held at two sep­a­rate lo­ca­tions.

In­ves­ti­ga­tions are con­tin­u­ing.

The lat­est ar­rests fol­lowed a sim­i­lar in­tel­li­gence-led op­er­a­tion con­duct­ed on Ju­ly 10 and 11, when 11 Venezue­lan na­tion­als—sev­en men and four women—were al­so found to have en­tered the coun­try il­le­gal­ly.

That ex­er­cise was car­ried out with the sup­port of GEB, the Trans­port Sec­tion and the Im­mi­gra­tion Di­vi­sion.

Po­lice said three of the in­di­vid­u­als held in Ju­ly were al­so in breach of De­por­ta­tion Or­ders. Ten of the 11 ap­peared be­fore Mag­is­trate Armi­na De­onar­i­nesingh this week and were each grant­ed $10,000 bail with a sure­ty, while the 11th was sen­tenced to 30 days’ sim­ple im­pris­on­ment.

The ex­er­cis­es were co­or­di­nat­ed by Snr Supt Ma­haraj, Supt Pa­ri­man, ASP Bis­nath, In­sp Phillip and Sgt Kater­son, work­ing in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Chief Im­mi­gra­tion Of­fi­cer.