Authorities should protect, not criminalize, survivors of deadly shipwreck
(KUALA LUMPUR, November 25, 2025)—Malaysian authorities should immediately withdraw immigration-related charges against 11 survivors of a shipwreck near Langkawi along the Malaysia-Thailand maritime border, Fortify Rights said today. On November 19, the authorities charged 11 of the 14 survivors—mostly stateless Rohingya refugees and genocide survivors from Rakhine State, Myanmar—under Malaysia’s Immigration Act for allegedly entering the country without valid documents.
“Rohingya refugees seeking safety from an ongoing genocide, and who may be victims of human trafficking, should never be criminalized for irregular entry or punished for circumstances beyond their control,” said Yap Lay Sheng, Senior Human Rights Specialist at Fortify Rights. “These charges are an outrageous stain on Malaysia’s international rights record. Instead of prosecuting Rohingya refugees, Malaysia should urgently extend protection to survivors of the Langkawi boat tragedy.”
On November 6, 2025, the Malaysian coast guard discovered a shipwreck near the Thai-Malaysian maritime border. Subsequently, the authorities launched an operation that rescued 14 survivors and recovered 29 dead bodies, including five children. Thai authorities also recovered seven dead bodies, bringing the total death toll to 36 at the time of writing. The authorities earlier believed a single vessel carrying at least 300 people first departed from Buthidaung Township in Rakhine State, Myanmar—historically, a majority Rohingya township—before splintering into separate, smaller vessels. Only one boat has been accounted for so far.
On November 19, 2025, authorities lodged criminal charges against 11 of the 14 survivors at the Langkawi Magistrate Court. However, the court later adjourned the case to December 21, due to the absence of court interpreters.
For more than a decade, transnational human trafficking syndicates have preyed on Rohingya refugees and exploited their desperation to escape genocide or dire conditions in refugee camps in Bangladesh. In March 2019, Fortify Rights and the National Human Rights Commission of Malaysia (SUHAKAM) published a 124-page report, “Sold Like Fish,” documenting how a transnational human-trafficking syndicate committed widespread and systematic crimes against Rohingya refugees and other migrants on land and at sea from 2012 to 2015, including torture, rape, killings, extortion, and enslavement, amounting to crimes against humanity under international law.
Ethnic Rohingya, a majority-Muslim group from Rakhine State in western Myanmar, face an ongoing genocide at the hands of the Myanmar military regime. Since a February 2021 military coup in Myanmar, the military junta, the Arakan Army—a powerful ethnic-Rakhine armed organization—and Rohingya armed groups have carried out abuses against Rohingya communities, including killings, mass arrests and detentions, forced conscription, and forced labor on the frontlines of armed conflict, driving fresh waves of displacement. The U.N. estimates that more than 600 people have already died or are missing in the Andaman Sea this year alone.
Malaysia has historically highlighted the plight of Rohingya Muslims internationally, including at a high-level conference at U.N. headquarters in September this year, attended by Fortify Rights Human Rights Specialist Zaw Win and CEO Matthew Smith. At the event, Malaysia’s U.N. ambassador stated: “As the conflict in Myanmar worsened, the security and humanitarian situation faced by the Rohingya and other minorities continues to deteriorate. … The gravity of this crisis demands our urgent attention and resolute action.”
However, despite its public advocacy for Rohingya rights, Rohingya refugees in Malaysia have long faced human rights violations, including arbitrary arrest and detention. Malaysia has not ratified the 1951 Refugee Convention and refuses to recognize refugee status, even when confirmed by the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees. As such, refugees in Malaysia regularly face arbitrary arrest and indefinite detention. Under Malaysia’s 1959 Immigration Act, anyone who lacks a “valid entry permit” is considered an “illegal” or “prohibited” immigrant. Under Section 35 of the Act, officers can arrest “without warrant” any person “reasonably believed” to be liable for removal. On November 19, 2025, the government announced plans to begin registering refugees in 2026 under a new Dokumen Pendaftaran Pelarian (Refugee Registration Document) scheme, though the details of the plan are unclear.
“Championing the Rohingya internationally while criminalizing them domestically is needless hypocrisy,” said Yap Lay Sheng. “Instead of prosecuting the survivors of the Langkawi shipwreck, Malaysia should be facilitating access to humanitarian assistance, legal representation, and refugee-status determination procedures. Dropping these ludicrous charges would send a clear message that the government takes its human rights duties seriously.”