PUTRAJAYA — Abuse by Immigration Department officers were among the reasons 131 undocumented migrants escaped from the Bidor Temporary Immigration Depot (DISB) on Feb 1 this year, an oversight body has found.
The Enforcement Agency Integrity Commission (EAIC) said the officers had also used “extreme violence” on detainees, Bernama reports, as found from an investigation the commission held into complaints received against misconduct by the immigration officers.
The detainees, mostly ethnic Rohingya, suffered violence as well as physical and mental abuse from immigration officers even before they were placed in the Bidor facility in Perak, while they were in Kem Wawasan Langkawi, Kedah from 2020 to 2021, the EAIC said in a statement on its investigation findings.
Bernama reports that the commission has decided to refer recommendations on punishments against the officers involved to the Immigration Department’s disciplinary authority.
EAIC will also make a police report on the matter for further investigation.
The commission’s other findings into the Bidor incident also found that department supervisors and members of the Malaysia Volunteers Corp Department (Real) who were on duty at the Bidor facility, were “insensitive” and “failed to monitor or control” the situation when the escape by detainees was mounted.
The EAIC also found that the building used to detain undocumented migrants, as a former camp for the National Service Training Programme, had infrastructural weaknesses that did not meet the standards required to function as a detention depot.
EAIC’s investigation into the incident is in accordance with subsection 27(4) of the Enforcement Agency Integrity Commission Act 2009.
On the night of Feb 1, 131 Rohingya immigrants escaped from the immigration detention centre in Bidor by rioting and damaging the depot fence.
Of the number of prisoners who escaped, 115 were Rohingya, 15 were Myanmar nationals and one was a Bangladeshi national. Based on media reports, the majority of them were rearrested over the next few days. – October 16, 2024