Two people are to be arraigned in court charged with retaining a Filipino man’s passport and trying to squeeze money out of him.

The government said that the case came to light after Identity Malta realised that the Filipino man’s residence permit had expired, during checks which have been stepped up in the fight against human trafficking.

Once tracked down, the man said that his passport had been taken by a foreign woman, who was married to a Maltese man, who was demanding money – on a usury basis – for the passport to be returned.

Identity Malta passed the information on to the police, who managed to get a confession from the woman.