A group of Vietnamese migrants who have lost their jobs in Malaysia and cannot afford to go home have started stealing and killing pet dogs and cats to eat, a report said today.

The New Straits Times newspaper said residents in the Kelemak industrial estate in the southern Malacca state have complained that their pets have gone missing.

Phan Ban Truan, 23, admitted he and his Vietnamese friends ate cats and dogs as they did not have enough money to buy meat, the paper said.

"We don't have money to buy meat. No food, we eat cats and dogs," he was quoted as saying.

Cat bludgeon to death

Phan said he and other workers wanted to return to Vietnam but did not have the money.

The Vietnamese worked at a latex factory but were laid off after the company stopped operations, the newspaper said.

A Nepalese worker, Leka Darma, 26, said he saw a Vietnamese man using a piece of wood to bludgeon a cat to death.

Lim Boon Kui, 64, a restaurant owner, said he lost two puppies and believed they had been eaten by the Vietnamese.

Cats and dogs are popular household pets in Malaysia. - AFP