The Interior Ministry of Kuwait has announced that it will arrest and deport all refugees and immigrants who have violated the country’s residency laws, Syrians and Yemenis in particular, and has begun handing some over to the Syrian regime.

On Saturday, the Kuwaiti daily newspaper Al-Rai quoted an unnamed source in the Interior Ministry announcing that “the ministry has arrested dozens of Syrians and Yemenis and will deport them from the country for the sake of the public interest.”

Forty Syrians are currently being detained in prisons within Kuwait awaiting deportation. They will be taken to the airport and sent directly to Syria. According to the newspaper, a total of 85 Syrians and Yemenis are set to be deported.

A committee was set up to study the condition of the expatriates, with its chair, Public Prosecutor General Mohammad Rashed Al-Duaij, recommending Syrians and Yemenis not be deported until the situation in their home countries improves. However it appears the government has not taken heed of the recommendations.

It is expected that some 146,000 Syrians currently reside in Kuwait, many of whom lived and worked there before 2011. The new arrests may affect scores of them and their families who subsequently fled the war torn country and joined their relatives.

Read: 400 refugees return from Lebanon to Syria