Malaysia: Crackdown on aliens to continue

KUALA LUMPUR (AFP) – Malaysia prepared yesterday to open its controversial deportation camps to inspectors from the Philippines but warned that a crackdown on illegal immigrants would continue.

Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, faced with the burning of the Malaysian flag by protesters in both Manila and the Indonesian capital Jakarta, granted a request by President Arroyo for the inspection of camps in Sabah state on Borneo island.

The state’s chief minister Chong Kah Kiat, however, told the official Bernama news agency yesterday that while the repatriation exercise was temporarily suspended, the operation to arrest illegal immigrants would continue.

Public sentiment in the Philippines and Indonesia has been inflamed both by reports of deaths during the mass expulsions which have seen more than 300,000 illegal immigrants leave Malaysia, and by the "insulting" legal whipping of those who failed to flee.

Malaysia has denied ill-treatment of the migrants and defended the mass deportations.

"Basically the request from the Philippine President is for Malaysia to halt the deportation process of Filipino nationals to give them the opportunity to see how the immigrants were treated while in detention," said Chong.

"We will give full cooperation. They will meet me. They will visit the three detention centers in Sabah. There is no ill-treatment."

The camps, each of which can hold 1,000 people, are in the capital Kota Kinabalu, and in the towns of Sandakan and Tawau on the east coast near the southern Philippines.

The Philippine team of inspectors led by Mrs. Arroyo’s adviser on Muslim affairs, Nur Jaafar, arrived in Sabah later yesterday.

Jaafar said at least 12,000 mostly Muslim Filipino migrants have arrived in the Philippines in recent weeks following Malaysia’s introduction last month of tough penalties for illegals, including imprisonment and up to six stroke of the cane.

He said another 80,000 were still waiting to be deported but the number of Filipino illegals in Sabah could be higher because there are "a lot of our countrymen still hiding" to avoid arrest.

Bernama reported that two Philippine naval vessels laden with more than 400 illegal immigrants, which were supposed to have left on Sunday, were still in Sandakan 36 hours after the passengers boarded.

The trip home was believed to have been delayed because of the temporary suspension of deportations, Bernama said, but Chong warned that the Philippines was now responsible for their welfare.

"These people are already on board their ships and it is their responsibility to make sure they are taken care of," he said.

A total of more than 300,000 illegal immigrants, mainly Indonesians, fled Malaysia during a four-month amnesty ahead of the introduction of the new laws on Aug. 1, putting pressure on their impoverished homelands.

At least 24 Indonesian workers have died of illness in the Indonesian border town of Nunukan after returning from Malaysia and thousands of others are threatened with sickness, health officials said last week.

The victims succumbed to various illnesses such as severe diarrhea and bronchial asthma.

Some 8.4 million Indonesians are jobless, and many in Nunukan are believed to be waiting for a chance to return to Malaysia, where the relatively developed economy offers jobs mainly in the construction and plantation industries.