Immigrant riot highlights Asia's plight
Immigrant riot highlights Asia's plight
By Nelson Graves
KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters): An uprising in a Malaysian detention
camp has thrown a spotlight on the human side of Asia's financial
crisis and the mounting immigration dilemma facing the region's
governments.
Malaysian officials said three Indonesians and one policeman
were killed during a pre-dawn riot on Thursday in the Semenyih
detention camp near the capital Kuala Lumpur.
Indonesian militants, citing underground sources, said 24
inmates from north Sumatra Island's Aceh region were killed in
the incident.
Whatever the death toll, the uprising was the most violent
incident since thousands of immigrants, uprooted by the nine-
month-old regional crisis, began flowing into Malaysia.
It revived a debate over the status of immigrants from Aceh
who say they will be persecuted if forced to return home.
The problem has a diplomatic dimension as Malaysia is
reluctant to grant refugee status to the Acehnese for fear of
upsetting its populous neighbor, Indonesia, human rights
advocates say.
Hundreds of Acehnese fled to Malaysia earlier in the decade to
escape fighting between the Indonesian army and Aceh Merdeka
(Free Aceh) separatist rebels.
The separatist rebellion in Aceh peaked in 1990 and has now
largely subsided, but a few skirmishes between the rebels and the
military are still reported.
"Malaysia's policy is it is Indonesia's internal problem, it
does not want to get involved," Elizabeth Wong, coordinator of
the Suara Rakyat Malaysia (Voice of the Malaysian People) rights
group, said.
But human rights advocates say Acehnese immigrants will be
persecuted if sent home and deserve refugee status.
The Malaysian government's sensitivity over the issue was
highlighted by authorities' efforts to clamp down on news
coverage of the riot.
The national police headquarters issued a request on Thursday
morning as word of the uprising spread asking media to "hold"
news of the incident.
Police at the Semenyih camp, about 40 km (25 miles) southeast
of Kuala Lumpur, asked photographers and cameramen at the site to
refrain from taking pictures, witnesses said.
Malaysian authorities are in a bind because thousands of
immigrants, mostly from Indonesia, have begun flowing across the
Malacca Strait in search of jobs.
But Malaysia, which for a decade relied on foreign workers to
keep its economic engine turning, is grappling with a slowdown
which, while less severe than the one in Indonesia, is forcing
some companies to lay off employees.
Malaysia's detention centers are filling up, stoking tensions
and putting pressure on authorities to step up repatriation
operations.
Police said some 500 Acehnese were put on a boat in Lumut, on
Malaysia's western coast, on Thursday for deportation. They did
not say precisely where in Indonesia the boat was headed.
"This is linked to a desperate effort to send people back to
their homes," Syed Husin Ali, president of the opposition Parti
Rakyat Malaysia party, said. "This is a good opportunity, when
waves of people are coming over, to send people back."
Wong said Malaysia, which she said has not signed the 1961 UN
Convention on Refugees, had quietly granted residential status to
a few hundred Acehnese but does not offer full political asylum.
"They claim they are political refugees. We take them at their
word. Aceh is as violent as East Timor. Their claims are
extremely legitimate," Wong said, referring to the former
Portuguese colony ruled by Jakarta.
A senior Indonesian diplomat said his government had
"undertaken to stem the flow of immigrants to Malaysia".
Tim Parritt of the London-based Amnesty International said his
group's concern was that Acehnese who deserved refugee status
would be repatriated. But he said he understood Malaysia's
plight.
"Which ones are genuine? Which ones are economic refugees
given the rapid increase in migrant workers? We are very
concerned that there are genuine asylum seekers," Parritt said.
"There is a risk there will be some real victims."