KUALA LUMPUR – Children detained indefinitely in Malaysia’s immigration detention centres face the likelihood of becoming adults in harrowing prison-like conditions, according to those who have access to detainees.
That is not the only nightmare scenario for underaged detainees, as more often than not, children in detention centres are separated from their parents once they reach puberty.
Such treatment is often considered inhumane, especially when conditions in the detention centres are described as substandard.
Doctors Without Borders’ (MSF) mission chief Froukje Pelsma told Scoop that while there are cases where children are separated from their parents, it is not the standard protocol as children and their parents of the same gender are kept together.
“So, if, let’s say, a son and mother are detained, the son will be separated upon adolescence.”
MSF has access to detention centres as its mission in Malaysia revolves around the provision of medical services to asylum seekers, especially refugees without United Nations High Commission for Refugees cards who would have to pay full foreign rates at public healthcare facilities.
Pelsma said a Health Ministry directive compels medical officers to report undocumented migrants to authorities, including refugees.
At the centres, MSF personnel are only allowed to treat detainees in a designated area but not to venture further into the facilities.
“The officers at the centres are cautious when we’re with a detainee. There’s usually an immigration officer with us. You could say that would go against medical confidentiality because patients must be able to confide in us without fear.
“However, we have been seeing improvements in their protocol. In one of the centres, we did consultations in the open and now have privacy screens.
“This comes after building relationships and trust with the officers. But we are not where we should be,” she said.
Detention centres are meant to be temporary holding facilities before detainees are deported. However, in the case of refugees, they cannot return to their home countries, while the stateless have nowhere to go.
This, Pelsma said, resulted in some of the detainees being stuck in the centres for years, with children growing into adults while in detention.
An indication of the poor standards that these children have to grow up in is the diseases often contracted by detainees.
According to Pelsma, detainees experience skin infections that could be due to dirty conditions in the cells and respiratory tract infections attributed to them sleeping on cold floors.
“We also see musculoskeletal diseases, depression and anxiety due to stress. People lose hope in these places. If you don’t know when you are going home and you’ve been there for years, you experience stress symptoms.”
According to a Human Rights Watch report on March 5, there are about 12,000 refugees and migrants detained in Malaysia.
The report also highlighted various allegations of abuse occurring at the centres.
Not only refugees, but also stateless
It may be common to think that only foreigners who overstay end up in the centres, but it would not be a stretch to assume an individual born in Malaysia could also end up there.
According to lawyer Agalya Munusamy, these are individuals classified as stateless, which includes anyone who does not have identification documents.
Pointing towards a woman’s ongoing battle to obtain citizenship, Agalya told Scoop of the plight of Tan Soo Yin, who was born and raised in Malaysia, but had no documentation as she was allegedly “sold off” by her parents.
Tan was arrested at a roadblock because she only had a MyKas (temporary identification document) and was detained.
She was later released via a habeas corpus application, but she remains stateless, as do her children.
Agalya said this is how children born in Malaysia could end up in detention centres as a result of inheriting their parents’ stateless status.
“I had a client who could not see her children (upon detention). Once inside these detention centres, you are at the mercy of the immigration officers there. They make the decisions.”
It is not just separating children from their parents, as according to Agalya, detainees have complained of certain practices that could amount to a violation of human rights.
The lawyer said she heard complaints ranging from physical beatings by the guards to food deprivation.
“I have been there to meet clients, but we are only allowed to go to a designated place, we don’t see the cells. But from what we have heard, these detainees have it bad. They are sometimes deprived of clean clothes and food.
“We also heard that those who share their limited food would be punished, while there are also countless complaints of physical abuse. But they wouldn’t even dare raise it in court.
“From what we understand, it is only when these detainees are brought to court they are given nice clothes to look presentable.”
On March 8, Home Minister Datuk Seri Saifuddin Nasution Ismail refuted Human Rights Watch’s report on degrading conditions in the centres, challenging the watchdog to back up their claims
However, on July 1, he told the Dewan Rakyat that there were 20 deaths reported in immigration depots comprising foreign nationals from Bangladesh, India, Iraq, Myanmar and the Philippines. Health reports and autopsy results indicated that these deaths were due to illnesses.
Scoop has reached out to Immigration Director-General Datuk Ruslin Jusoh for an interview to address these claims but has received no response. – July 23, 2024
