Don’t deport ex-Bangladeshi envoy, Suhakam tells immigration DG

 

Rieta Rahman and her son, Aayihim R Zaman, during a visit to Kuala Lumpur more than two years ago.

PETALING JAYA: The Human Rights Commission of Malaysia (Suhakam) has written to the immigration department urging it not to deport former Bangladeshi envoy Mohamed Khairuzzaman, who was detained last week.

In the letter to director-general Khairul Dzaimee Daud sighted by FMT, Suhakam commissioner Jerald Joseph said the commission was informed that Khairuzzaman, 65, had been arrested by the police and handed over to the immigration department to be sent back to Bangladesh.

Joseph pointed out that Khairuzzaman, Bangladesh’s high commissioner to Malaysia from 2007 to 2009, was a refugee and possessed a valid card from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

He said the former envoy’s life could be under threat if the department insisted on deporting him.

Mohamed Khairuzzaman.

“Suhakam recommends that the immigration department does not deport the detainee to Bangladesh and to instead release him on humanitarian grounds and to uphold the refugee’s right to safe asylum.

“Suhakam’s recommendations are in line with Article 9 and Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR),” he said.

Article 9 of the UDHR states that “no one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile”, while under Article 14, every person has the right to seek and enjoy asylum from persecution.

“These rights cannot be claimed for prosecutions that arise from non-political offences or from actions that go against the purposes and principles of the United Nations,” Joseph added.

FMT has reached out to the immigration director-general for comment.

Khairuzzaman was picked up by authorities from his residence in Ampang on Feb 10, and home minister Hamzah Zainudin said the arrest was carried out in accordance with legal procedures.

Khairuzzaman was recalled to Bangladesh two years after his appointment here after a change of government in Dhaka. He refused to return and has remained in exile in Malaysia since.

He is reportedly wanted in Bangladesh for undisclosed reasons, but his wife, Rieta Rahman, had contended that his arrest was politically motivated by the present Bangladesh government. - FMT