The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia authorities have arrested two Saudis who worked earlier as diplomats at the Saudi embassy in Bangladesh and 11 other people over their alleged involvement in corruption, the Saudi Gazette reported on Sunday.

The arrested ones also include two security men, eight expatriates and a foreign investor, the report said.

The arrests were made in security operations carried out jointly by the Oversight and Anti-Corruption Authority (Nazaha) and the Ministry of Interior.

The Nazaha revealed that the arrested former diplomats are Abdullah Falah Al-Shammari, former deputy ambassador and head of the consular section at the Saudi embassy in Dhaka, and Khaled Nasser Al-Qahtani, deputy head of the consular section at the embassy, and they were accused of intentionally colluding with some foreigners who confessed to engaging in the visa trade.

The report, referring to the authorities, said that it was proven that the former diplomats had obtained, during their work with the embassy, an amount of SR45 million, in installments, in exchange for completing the issuance of work visas in the Kingdom.

They confessed to receiving part of these amounts within the Kingdom, through the arrested expatriates, while investing the rest of the money outside the Kingdom, the report said.

The arrested Bangladeshis include Muhammad Nasir al-Din Nour, owner of a recruitment office in Dhaka, Al-Amin Khan Shahidullah Khan, holder of a visit visa, Zaid U Sayed Mufi and Abul Kalam Muhammad Rafiq al-Islam.

The arrested people admitted that they engaged in the activity of visa trade with complicity and that is in connivance with the employees of the Saudi embassy in Bangladesh, the report said.