Charles Hector
President of the Society for Christian Reflection

The Society for Christian Reflection views with grave concern several recent incidents relating to the forced repatriation of "illegal immigrants" from Indonesia. These incidents include the violence at the Semenyih Detention Camp in March when eight Indonesians and a Malaysians were killed; the incident on 31 March when 14 Indonesians forced their way into the the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) office in Bukit Petaling and the incident on 10 April, when 37 Indonesians scaled the walls of the United States, Swiss and French Embassies and Brunei’s Istana Sharif Ali claiming that they were political refugees from Aceh.

The government policy on repatriation of illegal immigrants from Indonesia needs to be reviewed and adjusted in order to deal with the complexities of the situation in Indonesia.

In dealing with illegal immigrants from Indonesia there are two factors from which we cannot run away from:

1. The deepening economic crisis and prolonged drought in Indonesia have led to millions of Indonesians facing severe hardships and in certain cases even food shortages; and

2. Separatist struggles exist in certain parts of Indonesia - among these struggles are separatist struggles in Aceh, East Timor and Irian Jaya.

We will not argue that illegal immigrants should not be deported, but to view everyone without a valid work permit as an illegal immigrant and nothing else is to tread on dangerous ground. More dangerous still is the attitude that has developed within a segment of the Malaysian population that these "illegals" are a threat to our way of life, and that all of them have to be dealt with in a harsh manner irrespective of their backgrounds.

The government has to adopt a humane two-pronged approach to the problem. Firstly with regards to those who are economic refugees, forced repatriation may be the only way. In this regard the government has to be firm. This firmness, however, has to be tempered with large doses of compassion. We are after all dealing with people who were struggling to make ends meet in Indonesia. Confronted with food shortages and massive unemployment they have sought refuge in a neighbouring country that was doing better than theirs. They are not criminals, merely people struggling to stay alive, and they deserve to be treated as human beings with dignity and respect.

Secondly, the government must acknowledge the possibility that among the ranks of the so-called "illegal immigrants" are also people who may have come to our shores to escape political persecutions. These people cannot be treated in the same way as those who are merely economic refugees. Why not work together with the United Nations High Commissioner on Human Rights (UNHCR) on this matter? If there are indeed such people in the detention camps for illegal immigrants, then why not let the UNHCR have full access to such people to determine their actual status before carrying out forced repatriations?

We can see no rationale for insisting that all the illegal immigrants from Indonesia are economic refugees and nothing else. We can understand that the Malaysian government may not want to take sides in any separatist struggle that is going on in Indonesia in the light of the way in which ASEAN (Association of South East Asian Nations) operates. But the Malaysian government cannot bury its head in the sand and denies the existence of such separatist struggles or the fact that Indonesia is going through a period of great political turbulence.

It is a sad day for Malaysia when illegal immigrants in this country have to burst into the UNHCR compound, or throw themselves at the mercy of the Americans, Swiss and French in order to put forward their case.