Minister of Home Affairs Datuk Azmi Khalid has announced that Rohingyas will, in addition to having been recognised as refugees since late last year, be permitted to work in Malaysia and be given job-related training for that purpose. He also said that the Rohingya children would be provided with education.
The Government should be commended for taking these steps forward. They are among the measures the implementation of which the Bar Council has urged in the past. They accord with international humanitarian principles, as well as the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
It now remains for the Government to expeditiously implement these measures, and put an end to the daily suffering of the Rohingyas as early as possible. In the interim, the Government must ensure that these Rohingyas (while waiting for their identification documents to be issued) are not harassed, arrested or detained by the police or the Immigration Department on the ground of their "illegal" presence in our country.
The Bar Council calls upon the Government to likewise make progress in other areas connected with the treatment of illegal migrant workers. One of the most urgent measures required is for the Government to immediately revoke the imposition of whipping on illegal migrant workers, a punishment (we are given to understand) that has already been inflicted upon thousands of these ill-fated persons.
Whipping is widely regarded as a cruel and barbaric form of punishment, which has been shown to produce long-term and harmful psychological effects. It has been discarded by most of the countries in the world. For a nation that subscribes to humanitarian principles and aspires to be in the top (rather than bottom) quadrant of the modern world, there is no justification whatsoever for Malaysia to administer such a merciless punishment on any human being, let alone on the ones who have worked and toiled in our country (thus contributing to its economy) and whose only offence is the absence of proper status.
Even though our laws deny them legal status, let us not take away their human dignity. Let their dignity not be violently torn apart, as it is when their naked skin splits open in indescribable agony. Let us not reduce these human beings to a chorus of uncontrollable screams that echo only within the confines of their four walls, unheard and unheeded by the rest of us who go about our daily lives believing that we are all part of a compassionate society.
The whipping must stop. Not next week, not tomorrow, but today.
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4th LAWASIA Family Law Conference, Penang (13 and 14 July 2012) Supported by Penang Bar Committee and the Malaysian Bar, this conference, themed “The New Global Family: Emerging Trends and Challenges to Family Practice”, will take place at Traders Hotel, Penang, on 13 and 14 July 2012 (Friday and Saturday). Click on the link above for more details.
News/Notices 
Minister of Home Affairs Datuk Azmi Khalid has announced that Rohingyas will, in addition to having been recognised as refugees since late last year, be permitted to work in Malaysia and be given job-related training for that purpose. He also said that the Rohingya children would be provided with education.
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Circular No 110/2012: Seminar on Introduction to ICC Arbitration: An Insight into the 2012 ICC Rules
