Immigration Dept deports 1,086 Myanmar nationals despite court order

KUALA LUMPUR – The Immigration Department confirmed the deportation of 1,086 Burmese nationals back to Myanmar.

This is despite an interim court order by the Kuala Lumpur High Court disallowing the move.

The department said that those deported were not of Rohingya ethnicity or asylum seekers, but were illegal Myanmar nationals.

Those who were sent back also agreed to return voluntarily without pressure from any party, the department said.

“This deportation programme is part of an ongoing deportation activity by the Immigration Department for detainees placed in immigration facilities.

“The deportation process in 2020 went at a slow pace because many countries have chosen to shut their borders,” Immigration director-general Datuk Khairul Dzaimee Daud said in a statement here today.

The high court ordered a temporary halt to the controversial plan to deport 1,200 Myanmar detainees to their homeland weeks after a coup, following a last-ditch legal challenge.

The high court said the repatriation cannot take place, allowing for a hearing tomorrow of a bid by Amnesty International and Asylum Access to stop the deportations, New Sin Yew, a lawyer representing the groups, told AFP.

Khairul said that the Home Ministry and Wisma Putra would continue efforts to receive agreements from countries such as Vietnam, Indonesia, and Bangladesh to take back their citizens, which are in immigration detention centres.

It is understood that the returning of these Burmese individuals today was done in cooperation with the Malaysian Army, Malaysian Navy, and the Myanmar embassy.

They departed from Lumut, Perak’s naval base, using three Myanmar navy vessels. – The Vibes, February 23, 2021