A Malaysian court is expected to bring charges against four Thai nationals on Friday in connection with the 2015 discovery of graves of more than 100 people-smuggling victims found in jungle camps near the Thai border, the minister of Inland Malaysia.
The Thai suspects were handed over to Malaysia on Thursday as part of a 2017 extradition request from Kuala Lumpur and an investigation into the discovery of the massive remains of Rohingya and Bangladeshi human trafficking victims in shallow graves in Wang Kelian, a village in Perlis State.
“They were handed over to us on June 22 and will be brought to the Court of Sessions in Perlis to be charged on Friday.” Interior Minister Saifuddin Nasution Ismail he said in a statement but without disclosing details.
A senior Malaysian police official, who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to reporters, said the Perlis police chief was scheduled to hold a press conference related to Thai nationals on Friday.
“All four will be charged with human trafficking,” he told BenarNews, an RFA-affiliated media outlet.
In January 2015, Malaysian authorities found 139 mass graves and 28 abandoned camps scattered near the rocky hills along the Thai-Malaysian border at Bukit Wang Burma in Wang Kelian, but waited four months to exhume the bodies.
More than 100 skeletal remains, believed to belong to members of Myanmar’s stateless Rohingya Muslim minority, were found in the graves, while other remains apparently belonged to undocumented migrants from Bangladesh.
After a group of similar mass graves was discovered in jungle camps abandoned by human smugglers on the Thai side of the border, in early May 2015 Thailand launched a crackdown on illegal immigration that sparked a humanitarian crisis in the Southeast Asian.
Nearly 3,000 ethnic Rohingya people from Myanmar and Bangladesh, abandoned by their caretakers on smugglers’ boats, have suddenly landed in Malaysia and Indonesia. It was only after news of the Thai graves hit the headlines that the Malaysian authorities publicized the discovery of the graves at Wang Kelian and moved to recover the remains of the victims.
Malaysian government-commissioned panel investigation report released last october found that officials could have prevented the torture and death of smuggling victims had they taken “a more proactive step in border control.”
“No extraordinary effort was required to detect what had happened in Bukit Wang Burma,” according to an excerpt from the Royal Commission of Inquiry report.
“The Commission regards the incident in Wang Kelian as a humanitarian tragedy that should never have happened in this day and age.”
No Malaysians have been charged in connection with the 2015 discovery. Only four foreigners have been convicted and jailed.
But in Thailand, prosecutors tried 102 people linked to 32 graves found on their side of the border. Of the 62 people convicted, one was a three-star general, who died in prison while serving an 82-year sentence.
‘No form of judgment on our side’
The Malaysian Home Minister said that this latest development was the result of close cooperation between his country and Thailand. In 2017, Malaysia requested the extradition of 10 Thai nationals.
“As a result of the close collaboration between the two countries, four of the 10 people were tracked down and brought before a Thai court to face extradition,” Saifuddin said.
“The extradition proceedings took place in many courts in Thailand, and the Court of Appeal of Thailand ordered on March 30 this year that the four people be handed over to Malaysia.”
However, Mohd. Mizan Mohammad Aslam, a professor at the Malaysian National Defense University, would like to see more active investigation on the Malaysian side.
“In Thailand, many people have been arrested for being involved in crime and ended up in prison,” he told BenarNews.
“However, for our part, we still have to take any action seriously; There hasn’t been any kind of judgment on our side.”
He urged the Malaysian authorities to find the local suspects involved in the case and put them behind bars.
“I think that if serious measures are not taken, these crimes may flourish again and create another Wang Kelian,” he said.
BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated news outlet.
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