MALAYSIA remains on the Tier 2 Watch List in the US State Department’s 2020 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report.

It is the third consecutive year Malaysia has found itself there.

The report stated that while Malaysia did not fully meet the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking, it was nevertheless making significant efforts to do so.

It added that Malaysia has maintained its standing because its government has devoted sufficient resources to a written plan that, if implemented, would constitute significant efforts to meet the minimum standards.

“Malaysia was granted a waiver per the Trafficking Victims Protection Act from an otherwise required downgrade to Tier 3.

“Therefore Malaysia remained on Tier 2 Watch List for the third consecutive year,” the report said.

Malaysia’s improved efforts against trafficking included identifying more victims than in the previous reporting period, increasing the number of trafficking-specialist prosecutors and drafting victim identification standard operating procedures (SOPs).

The Malaysian government also engaged two volunteer victim assistance specialists who worked with more than 100 victims, and co-hosted the first national conference on anti-trafficking, it said.

However, Malaysia failed to demonstrate an overall increase in anti-trafficking efforts compared with the previous year.

“The government prosecuted and convicted fewer traffickers, and the number of labour trafficking investigations was low compared to the scale of the problem.

“Despite ongoing concerns that corruption facilitated trafficking, the government did not make sufficient efforts to prosecute official complicity in trafficking-related crimes or make public the results of investigations into such crimes.”

Probe into complicity, forced labour

The country’s lack of interagency coordination and inadequate victim services were also a minus.

“This discouraged foreign victims from remaining in Malaysia to participate in criminal proceedings, impacted the success of law enforcement efforts to prosecute traffickers.”

It was recommended that Malaysia finalised, disseminated, and trained the relevant officials, such as labour inspectors and immigration officers, on SOPs for victim identification that included information on trafficking indicators.

Malaysia should also increase efforts to prosecute and convict more trafficking cases, including those involving complicit officials and forced labour.

“Make public the results of investigations involving corrupt officials to increase transparency and deterrence and hold officials criminally accountable when they violate the law.”

It urged the government to increase efforts to identify trafficking victims among vulnerable populations, including migrant workers and domestic workers.

“Increase law enforcement capacity to investigate and prosecute trafficking cases, including by improving interagency coordination.

Migrants’ rights

“Strengthen and continue to expand cooperation with civil society groups including through financial or in-kind support the groups to provide some victim rehabilitation services.”

The report also said Malaysia should expand labour protections for domestic workers and investigate allegations of domestic worker abuse.

“Expand efforts to inform migrant workers of their rights and Malaysian labour laws, including their rights to maintain access to their passports at any time, as well as opportunities for legal remedies to exploitation.

“Effectively enforce the law prohibiting employers from retaining passports without employees’ consent, including by increasing resources for labour inspectors.

“This should include language explicitly stating passports will remain in the employee’s possession in model contracts and future bilateral memoranda of understanding with labour source countries.”

In the 2017 TIP report, Malaysia was taken off the Tier 2 Watch List but slipped back the following year.

Between 2006 and 2018, Malaysia made the Tier 2 Watch List nine times.

Countries in Tier 2 do not fully meet the Trafficking Victims Protection Act’s (TVPA) minimum standards but are making significant efforts to meet those standards. 

The Tier 2 Watch List is for countries that meet the description for Tier 2 but which have failed to provide evidence of increasing anti-trafficking efforts or where the number of victims is significant or has grown. – June 26, 2020.