Dozens of Rohingya refugees and other Myanmar nationals have escaped from a provisional immigration detention centre in the northern region of the country, prompting Malaysia to conduct a search.
The Immigration Department issued a statement Thursday night that 131 men had escaped from the Bidor facility in the northern state of Perak, resulting in the death of one individual. The man was struck by a vehicle while attempting to cross the main north-south highway, according to Perak police. The men allegedly fled the camp after a disturbance.
Thirty-five were Rohingya, while the remaining sixteen belonged to various ethnic groups from Myanmar.
Ruslin Jusoh, director-general of the Immigration Department, stated that 375 civilian, military, and reservist volunteers had been mobilised in an effort to locate them.
Hundreds of thousands of predominantly Muslim Rohingya fled Myanmar for neighbouring Bangladesh in 2017 in response to a brutal military crackdown that is currently the subject of an International Court of Justice genocide investigation. Malaysia is a popular destination for these individuals.
Perilous Journeys and Precarious Lives
A considerable number of individuals have attempted to flee the deplorable conditions in refugee camps in Bangladesh and Myanmar by perilous maritime voyages to Southeast Asia. Last month, the UNHCR reported 569 deaths or disappearances at sea in the preceding year.
Myanmar nationals made up 88% of the 185,300 UNHCR refugees and asylum seekers in Malaysia in 2023.
The agency estimates 107,670 Rohingya, who were disenfranchised by a military administration in the 1980s.
Others from Myanmar have sought refuge in Malaysia amid a civil conflict. This conflict has worsened since the military overthrew Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government three years ago.
As Malaysia lacks an asylum application processing infrastructure, refugees are regarded as undocumented migrants. The majority of them lead precarious lives, fearing apprehension as “illegal migrants” or exploitation in low-paying positions desired by Malaysians.
In recent months, the immigration department has reported frequent operations in an effort to apprehend undocumented migrants. However, since August 2019, the UNHCR has been prohibited from entering immigration detention centres to verify the status of refugees.
Over 500 Rohingya refugees, including children, left a Penang temporary detention camp in April 2022 to cross the highway.
Six of them were killed in the attempt.
A disturbance was also attributed to that incident.
