Chennai: External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha has written to Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa that the Central Government was now devising country-specific modalities and checks to protect the interests of Indian nationals employed abroad.

The Indian missions abroad are fully seized of the importance of instituting a suitable mechanism for checking the bonafides of manpower recruiting agencies. The External Affairs ministry and the Indian missions abroad were now closely interacting with Labour ministry, in devising modalities, Sinha said in his reply to Jayalalithaa's recent letter on the subject.

An official press release, quoting Sinha, said the Union Government was in the process of finalising an agreement with the Malaysian Government to protect the Rights of Indian workers employed in Malaysia.

Referring to Jayalalithaa's letters on the arrest of eight Tamil youths from Ramanathapuram district, now languishing in a Malaysian jail, on charges of smuggling narcotics, and the plight of 16 Indian nationals -- 10 tamils and six Telugus -- who were cheated by a Malaysian recruiting agency, Sinha said every assistance was being extended to them by the Government.

"My Ministry and the missions abroad are taking every possible step to ensure the safety, security and welfare of all our citizens in foreign countries," the Union Minister said.