Asia Times: Testimony stirs questions on immigrants' treatment


	May 19, 2000	atimes.com

Southeast Asia

Testimony stirs questions on immigrants' treatment
By Anil Netto

KUALA LUMPUR - A former illegal immigrant from Bangladesh has shaken many with his testimony in a Malaysian courtroom about alleged torture and sexual abuse five years ago at a detention camp for illegal immigrants.

Bangladeshi Moron Mozumder's testimony on Monday, given at Malaysia's longest trial in history, raises the question of the treatment of foreign workers and illegal immigrants, a sensitive subject here.

Indeed, there has been little coverage of his testimony in the country's timid mainstream media, although the New Straits Times carried an inside story on Mozumder saying he saw female detainees being caned by police, and talking about starvation and poor health in the camps.

Mozumder, 44, had also been confined at the Kemayan detention camp in central Pahang state after his arrest in January 1994. He said he had been contacted in Bangladesh to testify in Malaysia.

He was testifying at the 230-day trial of activist Irene Fernandez of Tenaganita, a non-governmental organization that works with migrants and female workers. She is charged with publishing ''false news'' about the ill-treatment of detainees in camps for migrant workers.

Fernandez is also supreme council member of the opposition keADILan (the National Justice Party), which is headed by Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, wife of jailed ex-deputy premier Anwar Ibrahim. She faces three years imprisonment if convicted and is now out on bail.

Reporting on the Mozumder's testimony at the magistrate court, the independent web-based newspaper Malaysiakini said Mozumder testified that 120 detainees were allegedly ordered to perform acts of oral sex on each other as about half a dozen police personnel watched. ''The police forced the Burmese to come out to the field, rub soap on their private parts and ordered them to masturbate one another,'' he was quoted as saying.

Mozumder claimed he witnessed the alleged incident, which lasted more than 40 minutes, from the first floor of the block in which he was detained. ''The police beat up the detainees who refused to masturbate,'' he said. Asked what was the detainees' reaction, he replied, ''Most of them closed their mouths with their hands, and ran towards the toilet to vomit.'' As for the reactions of the police officers who had allegedly ordered the oral sex, he said, ''They were laughing and clapping.''

In another incident, Mozumder alleged that a sick inmate died soon after he was kicked by a police guard. ''The detainee had scabies and fever for 15 to 20 days, and later developed diarrhea,'' he said. One morning, Mozumder said the police ordered him to take the inmate out of the block. ''My friend and I brought him to the gate and the police told us to let him walk but he could not. Suddenly, the police kicked him so hard that he fell onto the ground and fainted. My friend and I pulled him up and within two minutes, he died,'' Malaysiakini quoted Mozumder as saying.

He alleged he was constantly beaten, stripped naked, sexually humiliated and forced to do gruelling physical punishments during his 21-month detention. Once, he said, he and his fellow inmates were ordered by the police to undress. ''We were totally nude and were instructed to sit cross-legged in one line,'' recounted Mozumder. ''Three police officers then walked on our knees. They were wearing boots,'' he alleged, adding that he was stepped on his knees six times.

The court has had to be adjourned several times when Mozumder would abruptly rush to the washroom to throw up, especially when he was describing the filthy toilet facilities in the camp. ''The toilet was scattered with faeces all over, both fresh and old faeces, and the walls had finger marks of excrements,'' he said. ''I had to squat with a cloth to block my nose and mouth. My bare feet were soiled with wet and dry faeces,'' he added. Mozumder alleged that he and other inmates were forced to scoop faeces with their bare hands as part of a punishment by the guards.

Mozumder also claimed that he had to eat grass with his rice as he was hungry. He said he picked the grass from the compound, washed it and ate it with his rice for four meals. But he said he had to stop eating grass after he developed diarrhoea.

Malaysiakini editor Steven Gan was himself involved in a newspaper probe on detention camps in 1995. As a journalist for a local daily then, he worked on a story about the Semenyih detention camp in Kajang, Selangor. ''We investigated Semenyih and we found that 59 had died due to malnutrition and easily treatable diseases like beriberi and diarrhoea,'' Gan said in an interview. ''The newspaper spiked that story and we gave that information to Irene.''

Fernandez was then working on a project on the health of migrant workers and eventually wrote a memorandum, sent it to the relevant ministries and called a press conference on August 25, 1995. That was the basis for her being charged for publishing false news under the Printing Presses and Publication Act.

Gan said the government itself had confirmed that 42 had died of diseases at Semenyih. But the authorities argue that the detainees were already in a weak state when caught and they died in camp. The authorities have so far not commented on the latest allegations, leaving them to the court to handle. They have been anxious to repair the image of the police, which took a battering after an independent commission of inquiry found that the country's then police chief has assaulted Anwar.

The newly formed Malaysian Human Rights Commission, meanwhile, is unlikely to probe the Fernandez case as it has indicated that it will not handle cases that are before the courts. Since its formation more than a month ago, the commission has already received 106 complaints.

Malaysia is host to about 700,000 legal foreign workers, most of whom are Indonesians and Bangladeshis. Officials estimate that there are 250,000 illegal foreign workers, though others say the actual figure could be much higher. In recent years amid Malaysia's economic downturn and rising unemployment, the authorities have stepped up efforts to detain and repatriate illegal workers.

(Inter Press Service)

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