VZCZCXRO6122
RR RUEHCHI RUEHDT RUEHHM RUEHNH
DE RUEHBD #0136/01 1270738
ZNR UUUUU ZZ
R 060738Z MAY 08
FM AMEMBASSY BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 4193
RUEHPNH/NVC PRTSMOUTH 0033
INFO UCNASE/ASEAN MEMBER COLLECTIE
RUEHCG/AMCONSUL CHENNAI
RUEHCI/AMCONSUL CALCTTA
RUEHBI/AMCONSUL MUMBAI
RUEHNE/AMEMBASSY NE DELHI 0071
RUEHGO/AMEMBASSY RANGOON 0167
RUEHH/AMCONSUL HONG KONG 0215
RUEHBJ/AMEMBASSY BEIJIN 0397
RUEHGH/AMCONSUL SHANGHAI 0006
RUEHGZ/AMCONSUL GUANGZHOU 0011
RUEHCN/AMCONSUL CHENGDU 0001
RUEHSH/AMCONSUL SHENYANG 0001
RUEHDN/AMCONSUL SYDNEY 0046
RUEHLO/AMEMBASSY LONDON 0148
RUEHFR/AMEMBASSY PARIS 0055
RUEAORC/USCBP WASHINGTON DC
RUEAHLC/HOMELAND SECURITY CENTER WASHINGTON DC

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 05 BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN 000136 
 
SIPDIS 
SENSITIVE 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR CA/FPP AND INL/HSTC 
DEPARTMENT PASS TO KCC 
POSTS FOR FRAUD PREVENTION MANAGER 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: KFRD CVIS CPAS CMGT ASEC BX
SUBJECT: Brunei Fraud Conditions Summary - FY2008 
 
REF: 07 Bandar Seri Begawan 330 
 
BANDAR SER 00000136  001.2 OF 005 
 
 
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Summary 
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¶1. (U) Brunei is a low-fraud environment for consular services and 
historically has had low rates of fraud and low non-return rates. 
Brunei has been a member of the Visa Waiver Program since its 
inception.  On May 5, the Government of Brunei announced that it 
would begin issuing ICAO compliant biometric passports.  We remain 
alert to the potential for abuse of Bruneian travel documents by 
mala fide travelers, though are aware of few actual instances of 
such abuse.  A significant guest-worker population gives rise to 
some potential vulnerabilities to visa fraud and accounts for the 
majority of our visa refusals.   We have not detected any patterns 
of visa fraud.  Our key concern related to consular services is the 
potential for fraud by individual visa applicants, including 
possible visa shoppers from the region.  The Fraud Prevention Unit 
and Embassy Manila provide support to Embassy BSB for fraud 
prevention and security analysis purposes.  We are also concerned 
about the exploitation of some of Brunei's porous borders and the 
potential use of Brunei as a transit point by alien smugglers and/or 
human traffickers.   END SUMMARY. 
 
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COUNTRY CONDITIONS 
------------------ 
 
¶2. (U) Brunei has been a member of the Visa Waiver Program since its 
inception.  Brunei has only just begun issuing biometric passports. 
Citizens who wish to travel to the United States whose passports 
were issued on or after October 26, 2006 must obtain a visa to 
travel.  Annual visa workload for FY 07 was 599 applications with an 
adjusted refusal rate of 6 percent.  Workload has shown a steady 
increase in the current fiscal year, primarily due to the gap in 
issuing biometric passports that would allow visa waiver travel and 
also to an increase in commercial, business, and government linkages 
with the United States.  Trade with the United States has increased 
at a steady rate for the past several years, but almost tripled in 
2007 due to a major sale of aircraft to the main oil and gas 
producing company.  Students in the U.S. have surpassed pre-9/11 
levels from a low of only 12 students just two years ago to a 
current 30 students actively studying in the U.S. according to SEVIS 
data.  We expect continued growth in Brunei citizens studying in the 
U.S. with the opening of government scholarships for undergraduate 
study and the renewal of programs for government-funded, mid-career 
masters-level study which had fallen off in the late 1990s. 
 
¶3. (U) Brunei depends on large numbers of foreign guest workers from 
its neighbors, particularly Malaysia, Indonesia, and the 
Philippines.  There are two very distinct categories of foreign 
workers: low skilled manual laborers, domestics or low skilled 
office and shop workers - mainly from Indonesia, Malaysia, the 
Philippines, Bangladesh, and Thailand; and management and highly 
skilled technical workers in every industry but with the largest 
concentrations in the IT and oil and gas industries.  There is also 
a sizable population of third country national engineers and other 
professionals from oil-rich countries such as Nigeria and Venezuela. 
 Many of the latter apply for visas either to conduct business or 
training in the United States or to transit on their way to 
Venezuela and other destinations. 
 
¶4. (SBU) Brunei prohibits permanent immigration for manual and 
low-skilled workers, many of whom live in Brunei for decades on work 
permits.  Even more highly-skilled individuals find it difficult to 
meet Brunei's tough standards to qualify for permanent residence - a 
minimum of 15 years residency and strong Malay language skills. 
Citizenship is even more tightly controlled, requiring an additional 
 
BANDAR SER 00000136  002.2 OF 005 
 
 
15 years residency after obtaining permanent resident status. 
General ideological and cultural preferences for ethnic Malays and 
adherents to Islam means in practice that non-Muslims may have a 
more difficult time obtaining either permanent residency or 
citizenship.  Generations of long-term residents, particularly 
ethnic Chinese, have made Brunei their home without access to the 
rights of citizenship.  In many cases, these individuals give birth 
to children in Brunei but are unable to meet transmission 
requirements to pass any citizenship to their children.  Brunei thus 
has a very large community of "stateless" permanent residents who do 
not have access to any country's citizenship either through their 
parents or through their birth in Brunei.  Brunei issues these 
individuals "Certificate of Identity" and accords them permanent 
residen status.  Post routinely issues NIVs to this categry of 
de-facto Bruneians who, despite their lackof citizenship, have 
strong family and economic tes to Brunei. 
 
¶5. (U) The range of nationalitiesand skills sets in Brunei is 
reflected in post'snon-immigrant visa applicant pool.  In FY 2007, 
0 percent of our NIV applicants were third countrynationals (TCNs) 
holding citizenship in 32 countries.  Bruneian applicants accounted 
for approximately one third, with Malaysia at seventeen percent and 
the Philippines at fifteen.  Philippine applicants accounted for 
nearly all visas refused. 
 
¶6. (U) Visa applications from TCNs are likely to increase at a 
modest rate, due to a growing multinational corporate presence; 
successes in the Embassy's outreach program to increase 
international academic, research, and cultural exchanges; a steady 
stream of third country national residents; and robust annual growth 
in trade with the United States. 
 
¶7. (U) While in general Brunei is a low-fraud environment, the range 
of nationalities as well as the small volume of applications 
presents a challenge for post to remain vigilant against fraudsters 
and visa shoppers from the region and to remain current on the 
ever-morphing methods of fraud that develop world-wide. 
 
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NIV FRAUD 
--------- 
 
¶8. (U) Our greatest vulnerability to fraud is at the individual case 
level, not on an organized basis.  The most likely candidates to 
engage in individual fraud are work pass holders from the 
Philippines who are working in low-level office jobs and being paid 
a low wage (albeit higher than they would receive in the 
Philippines).  Our 214(b) refusal rate tends to be high for this 
category of applicant and, thus, we are vigilant for the possibility 
of fraud.  That said, the most common problem among these applicants 
is not outright fraud but occasional "inflation" of credentials 
through the use of loaned funds to bolster bank accounts, 
exaggerated claims of employment status or responsibility, or the 
provision of incomplete information about family members in the 
United States.  This type of credential inflation is conducted at 
the individual case level; we have not detected any patterns to 
suggest that any organized third party provision of false 
documents. 
 
¶9. (U) Another potential fraud area is for applicants in categories 
known to be high-fraud and that do not require applicants to meet 
residence abroad requirements, such as H-1Bs, to apply for visas in 
Brunei where our familiarity with world-wide fraud trends may be 
less extensive.  We are aware of the potential for such applicants 
to target post as an "easy mark" and work closely with posts in the 
region and posts in the applicants' country of nationality to ensure 
that visa shoppers do not subvert the integrity of the visa process. 
 All NIV issuances are reviewed by the Manila Fraud Prevention Unit, 
in part to help address this potential vulnerability to fraud. 
 
BANDAR SER 00000136  003.2 OF 005 
 
 
 
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IV FRAUD 
-------- 
 
¶10. (U) Embassy Bandar Seri Begawan does not process immigrant 
visas, but does provide information and accept I-130 petitions from 
resident Americans for forwarding to Embassy Singapore or Kuala 
Lumpur for adjudication and processing of the immigrant visa. 
Usually petitioners are long-term residents of Brunei known to post 
and relationships appear to be genuine. 
 
-------- 
DV FRAUD 
-------- 
 
¶11. (U) Embassy Bandar Seri Begawan does not process diversity 
visas.  We occasionally provide basic information on the diversity 
visa but are unaware of any DV-related fraud in Brunei or by 
Bruneians. 
 
---------------------- 
ACS AND PASSPORT FRAUD 
---------------------- 
 
¶12. (U) We have detected no fraud in applications for U.S. passports 
and other ACS services.   In one instance last year, one American 
citizen provided insufficient evidence to allow for single-parent 
signature on a passport application of a minor child in a possible 
attempt to mislead the consular officer about his custodial rights. 
There was no outright fraud involved. 
 
-------------- 
ADOPTION FRAUD 
-------------- 
 
¶13. (U) To the best of our knowledge there has never been an 
adoption of a Bruneian child by a foreign citizen. 
 
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USE OF DNA TESTING 
------------------ 
 
¶14. (U) Post has referred only one case for DNA testing to verify 
blood relationship in support of a citizenship claim.  The DNA 
result was positive and there was no fraud uncovered. 
 
---------------------------------- 
ASYLUM AND OTHER DHS BENEFIT FRAUD 
---------------------------------- 
 
¶15. (U) Post has had no applications for asylum and has received no 
inquiries/requests from U.S. legal permanent residents or other 
applications for DHS benefits. 
 
--------------------------------------------- - 
ALIEN SMUGGLING, TRAFFICKING, ORGANIZED CRIME, TERRORIST TRAVEL 
--------------------------------------------- - 
 
¶16. (U) We have received occasional reports of mala fide travelers 
interdicted around the world attempting to use altered Bruneian 
passports for VWP travel to the United States.  We are unaware of 
any significant trends or high numbers of misuse of the Bruneian 
passport, though we have continued to press Brunei to move forward 
with its biometric passport program in order to combat this 
potential problem. 
 
¶17. (SBU) Three known cases last year highlighted that alien 
smugglers and/or human traffickers have exploited some of Brunei's 
 
BANDAR SER 00000136  004.2 OF 005 
 
 
more vulnerable land border checkpoints and used Brunei as a transit 
point. (Reftel)  None of the cases involved trafficking to the 
United States, but two did involve the apparent trafficking of young 
women (to Australia and to London) and two American Citizens who 
traveled on the same routes were identified as potential 
facilitators.  Evidence suggests that these were not the first cases 
and this may have been a now-disrupted but established route.  There 
is no indication that there was any nexus to terrorism. 
 
-------------------------------- 
DS CRIMINAL FRAUD INVESTIGATIONS 
-------------------------------- 
 
¶18. (U) There have been no DS criminal fraud investigations in 
Brunei involving consular matters. 
 
---------------------- 
HOST COUNTRY DOCUMENTS 
---------------------- 
 
¶19. (U) All residents carry an identification card of some sort. 
Citizens carry a national identification card (yellow), issued 
starting at age 12; permanent resident cards are pink and work 
permit cards are green.  All i.d. cards are of high quality and 
include machine readable zones, digitized photos, and some security 
features such as holograms.  National identification cards also 
contain an encrypted chip which, in the future, will serve as a 
public key for bearers to gain access to banking and other services. 
 We have not detected any apparent fraud in identification cards, 
but would approach the host country to confirm a document if a 
suspicion arose.  We understand that the GOB collects two thumb 
prints from all identity document applicants and stores the prints 
in a national database. 
 
¶20. (U) Passports: On May 5, the GoB announced that it would 
commence production and issuance of fully ICAO compliant biometric 
passports.  Post will forward exemplars as soon as we receive our 
copies.  Prior to this announcement, the GoB had been issuing 
regular passports (red cover) to Brunei citizens and issues official 
and diplomatic passports (black cover) to government officials to 
support official travel.  These previous passports are high quality 
and contain a digitized photo, machine readable zone and a security 
laminate on the data page. 
 
-------------------------------------------- 
COOPERATION WITH HOST GOVERNMENT AUTHORITIES 
-------------------------------------------- 
 
¶21. (U) The Immigration and Customs Enforcement's Forensics 
Documents Lab, in coordination with the Joint Interagency Task Force 
(JIATF) West, provided document screening training last year for 
officers from Brunei's immigration, police, and customs 
organizations.  The training was well-received and Brunei has 
expressed interest in additional training. Post is working with ICE 
for further training should funding become available.  Note: Royal 
Brunei Airlines staff, but not Immigration officials, detected 
malafide travelers with fraudulent Malaysian passports in a possible 
person-smuggling ring that appeared to have exploited a weakness at 
a remote land border crossing point to facilitate travel to third 
countries (reftel). 
 
¶22. (SBU) Brunei is considering signing an agreement with the United 
States to exchange unclassified information on known and suspected 
terrorists under Homeland Security Presidential Directive-6.  Brunei 
shares lost and stolen passport information with Interpol but does 
not share this data directly with the United States. 
 
¶23. (SBU) Law enforcement cooperation with the United States is 
good, but typically incident-based and not proactive.  Brunei's law 
 
BANDAR SER 00000136  005.2 OF 005 
 
 
enforcement capabilities are professionally sound, but uneven, and 
tend to be deployed only after a crime is detected.  However, the 
Internal Security Department and religious authorities maintain a 
close watch on religious groups and Brunei's very limited political 
activity to head off any potential challenges to the authority of 
the royal family or the government.  The Immigration Department 
vigorously and proactively enforces immigration law, frequently 
screening the foreign worker population for over-stayers and persons 
working without a work-permit.  Post's RSO has worked closely with 
non-resident USG law enforcement attaches (FBI, DEA, DHS) to build 
stronger relationships with host country law enforcement. 
 
--------------- 
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT 
--------------- 
 
¶24. (U) Post would like to thank Singapore CONS Chief Julie Kavanagh 
for her substantial and significant contribution to this report. 
Thanks, Julie - we could not have completed this without you. 
Manila FPU has cleared on this report. 
 
 
SKODON