KUALA LUMPUR, July 4 (NNN-THESTAR) -- A massive Malaysian police operation to nab foreign syndicates involved in cheating locals and foreigners of millions of ringgit saw more than 100 foreigners and six locals being detained.

In the sting operation codenamed Ops Tiong, police together with the Immigration Department, Higher Education Ministry, Tourism Ministry and Rela raided two locations on Monday where they stormed into 20 apartment units in Petaling Jaya and Subang Jaya.

The raids started at about 11.30pm and ended at 3am.

The foreigners arrested were from Nigeria, Cameroon, Somalia, the Philippines, Sierra Leone and New Zealand.

Selangor police chief Deputy Comm Tun Hisan Tun Hamzah said 26 of those arrested were found to be involved in commercial crimes.

“We received 371 reports last year and this year pertaining to the parcel scam where the victims claimed they lost more than RM15mil to such syndicates.

“The modus operandi is to lure young local women through social networking sites and tell them they have a gift waiting.

“The syndicates' local women accomplices, impersonating Customs officers, would then call up the victims and tell them they needed to pay tax' before they could get the gift', he told a press conference at his office in Shah Alam.

He also said most of the foreigners entered the country using student visas and had registered themselves in local colleges.

“The case is being investigated under Section 420 of the Penal Code for cheating and all those arrested have been remanded for four days,” he said, adding that 58 others detained had been released while three more tested positive for drugs.

In an unrelated case, DCP Tun Hisan said police arrested two men believed to be involved in credit card forgery for the past three months.

The two, aged 31, had six fake credit cards on them when arrested in a restaurant in Serdang on Saturday. Police seized another 636 fake credit cards at their apartment in Kompleks Suria Kinrara. -- NNN-THESTAR