LETTER | We Malaysians are quick to speak up when we see injustice elsewhere. We champion Palestine. We condemn what’s happening to the Rohingya. We call out powerful nations when they trample on human dignity.

While we’re busy lecturing the world about justice, there’s a quiet tragedy unfolding right under our noses.

Over the past five years, 465 people, including 12 children, have died in our immigration detention centres. Not in war zones and not in natural disasters. They died while in our government’s care.

I can’t help but ask: where’s our outrage?

These aren’t just numbers we can brush aside with a parliamentary reply or some bureaucratic explanation. These are lives, people who had names, families, dreams. They died not because of some unstoppable tragedy, but because of conditions we allowed to persist.

We need more than statements. We need a full, independent royal commission of inquiry. We need transparency and accountability because when people die in government custody, every single Malaysian should be demanding answers.

Look, I understand the need to protect our borders. Every country has that right. But there’s a world of difference between enforcing immigration laws and allowing detention centres to become places where people get sick without treatment, lose all hope, and die - so often that it stops being shocking.

The 12 children. How does a child die in detention? How is that not enough to shake us all awake?

Most of those detained aren’t criminals or terrorists. Some are trafficking victims. Some were tricked by agents who promised them a better life. Some are fleeing persecution in their own countries. Their papers might not be in order, but their humanity is undeniable.

So here’s what I don't understand: why are we locking up vulnerable people for months or even years while the real criminals - the trafficking syndicates, the corrupt employers, the middlemen - keep making money? We’re fighting the victims while the masterminds go free.

Prove we’re civilised

This isn’t just an immigration problem. It’s a test of who we are as a nation.

If we want to be a regional leader, if we want respect on the world stage, it has to start here. We can’t demand justice elsewhere while people suffer in facilities we control.

The government needs to act. Independent inquiries into every detention death. Regular public reports on conditions. Proper healthcare, better sanitation, and faster repatriation for those who want to go home.

Work with the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) to process asylum claims, and please - children should almost never be detained. We need community-based alternatives.

None of this weakens our security, but it strengthens our rule of law. It proves we’re a civilised nation.

History won’t be kind if we knew about this suffering and did nothing. Our children won’t remember our press releases or parliamentary debates. They’ll remember whether we chose compassion over complacency. Accountability over excuses. Humanity over indifference.

465 deaths - that’s not a statistic but 465 unanswered questions. Until we answer them, Malaysia’s conscience will remain trapped behind the very barbed wire we built.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.