(Photo of the Bureau of Immigration)
The pair, identified as 54-year-old Wang Songyi and 50-year-old Liao Fudi, were supposed to board a Philippine Airlines flight heading to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
The two Chinese nationals were intending to travel to Canada using their Costa Rican passports to sidestep the Canadian entry visa requirement for Chinese nationals.
BI staff intercepted the two men after noticing anomalies in the passports they presented. The arrival stamps in these passports, allegedly from the Philippines, were identified as counterfeit upon investigation by the BI forensic documents laboratory.
The two men, who were unable to communicate in Spanish, the official language of Costa Rica, also confessed they were Chinese nationals and surrendered their Chinese passports with the likewise counterfeit immigration arrival stamps.
The two foreigners are currently held at the BI Detention Facility in Camp Bagong Diwa, Bicutan, Taguig City and have been charged with deportation.
