I’m currently in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia interviewing ethnic Burmese Chin refugees. They are urban refugees, unlike the refugees in the camps in Thailand. We’re working in the city of Kuala Lumpur at the UN site. The refugees are coming from all over Malaysia. The current safety situation for these refugees is rapidly deteriorating. All who we interview have UNHCR ID cards which, in theory, are provided to give a certain level of protection. However, the ID cards have stopped working. There is an organized police force, apart from the city police, whose sole purpose is to round up refugees and bring them in to the city police. When a refugee is caught and brought in for detainment, that “police officer” is given a bounty of $15 per refugee. $15 is a lot of money for capture of a refugee. And especially when so many are being captured. Many of our refugees that have gone through the interviewing process with us and with DHS and who have been approved and are ready to fly…are suddenly captured and imprisoned. They are not showing up for their flights to safety because they have been already been caught.
Refugees are illegal in Malaysia. The government does not allow organized refugee camps or communities to exist. These urban refugees live in hiding and they live in constant fear. Each night at dusk, the refugees begin their night on the move. They stay in stadiums, constructions sites, and old buildings. Large masses of them stay together and those friends and family who are separated frequently call each other throughout the night to be sure the other has not been captured. It’s a game. And when I think of it; it makes me ill.
Our interpreters are local refugees themselves. They are my colleagues. They have no place to sleep at night; they can’t afford to sleep or they may be caught and imprisoned. I go home to a furnished serviced apartment. Sometimes it’s hard to sleep at night. I’m safe and comfy and my colleagues are out hiding and running in the dark to keep from being caught. We offer them protection during the day while we’re at work on the UN compound; but at night they’re on their own. And some mornings, a few of the interpreters won’t show up. They’ve been captured.
Many of these urban refugees come to Malaysia to work; rather than staying in a camp in Thailand. There’s also the battle between the ethnic Chins and the Karen…the Karen live in the camps in Thailand and don’t consider the Chins equal. Why do people hate each other so much? One is forced to leave their country for the safety of their lives from a corrupted government with soldiers who attack and kill; they then flee to a nearby camp where it is relatively safe, but the opposing ethnic group won’t accept them and chase them out. They reach a third country and find that there are organized groups that scour the city at night looking to arrest and detain them in prison, and who get a reward for doing so. All the while, one has to search for food and take the chance of closing their eyes for sleep at some point. Will they wake up in a prison cell or attacked by a military soldier? Or will they awake to the sun and start another day hiding and running and never really feeling safe.
