Stop deporting Myanmar asylum seekers, says rights group

 

About 185,000 refugees and asylum seekers, the majority from Myanmar, are registered with the UN refugee agency, says a US-based group. (Bernama pic)

PETALING JAYA: A human rights group has urged the government to stop deporting Myanmar asylum seekers, saying their lives are being put in danger.

The New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Malaysian authorities had sent home more than 2,000 Myanmar nationals, including military defectors, without assessing their asylum claims or other protection needs.

More than half of the 2,000 were deported in the past two months, it said.

“Sending asylum seekers back to Myanmar means putting activists, dissidents, and persecuted minorities in the crosshairs of the repressive junta,” said Shayna Bauchner, HRW’s Asia researcher.

The group called for the United Nations refugee agency UNHCR to be given “immediate and unfettered access” to everyone held in immigration detention so that claims of refugee status and other needs for protection could be assessed.

The group said Myanmar embassy officials had met Malaysian immigration officials last month to discuss the deportation of Myanmar nationals in immigration detention.

Three chartered deportation flights had been arranged since then; the first flight returned 149 Myanmar nationals on Sept 22, followed by 150 on Oct 6 and 150 on Oct 20, said HRW.

Reuters reported that the Oct 6 flight included six officers who had defected from the Myanmar navy. HRW said Myanmar junta officials detained at least one of the officers and his wife upon their arrival in Yangon.

HRW said 1,500 other Myanmar nationals were deported between April and mid-September.

About 185,000 refugees and asylum seekers – the majority from Myanmar, including over 100,000 ethnic Rohingya Muslims – are registered with UNHCR in Malaysia. At least 17,500 people are being held in 21 immigration detention centres across the country, including more than 1,500 children.

Myanmar has been in crisis since last year when the military overthrew the elected government led by Aung San Suu Kyi’s party before leading a deadly crackdown on dissent.

Tens of thousands of people have reportedly been jailed and many tortured, beaten or killed, in what the UN has called crimes against humanity. - FMT