Australia asks for Jordan's cooperation to prevent illegal immigration

Australian Minister of Immigration Phillip Ruddock announced on Wednesday in Amman that Australia has asked for Jordan's cooperation in arresting illegal immigration traders who use the Jordanian territories as a base or a crossing to enter Australia and to prevent them from doing so.

He also announced a group of cooperation measures aimed at confronting the problem of illegal immigration. He added that Amman and Canberra agreed to exchange information and joint cooperation plans in this respect.

The two countries also agreed to strengthen technical cooperation to cover extra training and necessary equipment to uncover operations of falsifying passports and to follow up on illegal immigrants.

Ruddock stated that several of the illegal immigrants come from Iraq and Afghanistan. "I cannot make contact with these two countries, but I presume we can cooperate with their neighbors."