Manama: Security authorities in Saudi Arabia have detained an employee for his involvement in an attempt to smuggle out Pakistani nationals via the King Fahd Causeway, the terrestrial link with Bahrain.

The plan was discovered by secret police agents in the Eastern Province city of Dammam who learned that a Pakistani wanted in several legal cases was working on smuggling out fellow citizens to neighbouring Bahrain. Under the plan, an employee working at the causeway would be given SR50,000 to facilitate the smuggling.

Acting on the information, the security agencies coordinated their efforts in order to arrest all those involved in the attempt, Saudi news site Sabq reported on Monday.

All the suspects, including the employee, were eventually arrested on Friday at 2am at the causeway and referred to the competent authorities for legal action.

It was unclear why the Pakistanis were smuggled out of the country, as authorities typically do not specify the reasons.

Online users widely condemned the employee for accepting a bribe in order to help smuggle people, saying that he was working against the public order and the interests of the nation.

The attempt to smuggle the Pakistanis via the 25-kilometre causeway is the latest in a series of bid to move people or prohibited items into or out of Saudi Arabia or Bahrain.

Earlier this month, Saudi authorities foiled an attempt to smuggle a foreign woman into the country by hiding her inside a car.

The woman was reportedly “concealed” under a pile of clothes behind the front seats of the car crossing the causeway.

“A car arrived early in the morning to the customs area for clearance,” Daif Allah Al Otaibi, the general director of customs at King Fahd Causeway, said. “During the routine inspection, a foreign woman was discovered on the mats and under a pile of clothes behind the driver’s seat. The ruse obviously did not work and the customs officer reported the case. The procedures in such cases are being followed,” he said.

The nationality of the woman and the reasons for the smuggling were not announced by the authorities.

In June 2013, an attempt to smuggle a European woman into Saudi Arabia was foiled by local customs officers.

The woman whose nationality was not revealed did not have a passport and was hiding under a large carpet and a small wooden table on the Pajero floor mats.

The woman was discovered as the customs inspected the car driven by a British national.

Thousands of vehicles and passengers, mainly Saudis, regularly use the terrestrial link, particularly over the weekend.

Customs officers on both sides of the causeway have been engaged in a relentless battle against incredible ruses to smuggle weapons, explosives, alcohol, birds and animals, a task that has been rendered particularly challenging by the high number of daily users and commuters.

In May, Saudi Arabia foiled an attempt to smuggle RDX — a highly explosive material — and detonators intended to be used in the kingdom.

The Saudi security men had doubts about the two men driving into Saudi Arabia and decided to search their car.

The inspection yielded 14 bags carefully hidden inside the back seats of the car. Officials said that 11 bags contained more than 30 kilos of the RDX and two bags had 50 blasting caps. The last bag had a six-metre detonator cord.

In March, Bahraini authorities said that they seized bomb-making material on a bus coming from Iraq via Saudi Arabia with 55 passengers on-board, mostly women and children.

“A screening of the passengers’ luggage with X-ray machines showed that one of the bags contained suspicious things,” Advocate General and Terror Crimes Chief Prosecutor Ahmad Al Hammadi said. “During a closer inspection, 140 electric detonators, 41 electric circuits that could be used in blasts, a remote control and some mobile phones were found hidden inside some electrical appliances in the bag.”

The causeway was opened on November 26, 1986 by the then rulers of Saudi Arabia and Bahrain King Fahd Bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud and Shaikh Eisa Bin Salman Al Khalifa.