The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has scaled back registration of asylum seekers at its Kuala Lumpur office in order to clear the backlog from a record number of applications last year.

UNHCR acting representative Stephane Jaquemet said the agency has decided to pause its regular registration activities due to lack of capacity to cope with thousands of cases that are still pending review.

Illustrating the extent of the problem, he said the number of people seeking asylum jumped five-fold from some 2,500 individuals in 2002 to more than 13,000 last year.

"Not all of (those who approached the office last year) will be called up for an interview but (from those that are) we still have another 2,000 persons to be interviewed," he said when contacted today.

Jaquemet said the suspension has been effective since last November and is expected to be maintained until March.

Refugee hotline

In addition to clearing the backlog, Jaquemet said the UNHCR Kuala Lumpur office is also undergoing a restructuring exercise in order to improve its management of the growing numbers of refugee applications.

"We are trying to do an analysis of why the numbers have been growing. The situation is becoming unmanageable because our office here is not equipped to deal with the hundreds of people we get some days.

"We need an orderly system because we don't want a crowd problem and we also do not want applicants to have to wait the whole day and at the end of it, fail to register."

Stressing that the slowdown does not mean that the UNHCR has "closed shop" temporarily, he said registration is still possible for pressing cases.

"We have people who are still registering urgent cases and we have set up a hotline for people to call us in case of emergency."

Asylum seekers from Aceh who approach the office are still being issued with temporary protection letters in view of the continuing conflict in the northern Sumatran province, he said.

The temporary ruling will affect only asylum seekers of other nationalities, mainly those from Burma who form the largest group of persons claiming protection at the office.

'Left in a lurch'

This development has generated numerous complaints from affected asylum seekers who fear that new arrivals will be unable to register for protection, and therefore be more vulnerable to arrests.

"It has been very difficult for some people. They are undocumented and cannot get a registration letter so they are stuck," said a Burmese activist who declined to be named.

He acknowledged, however, that the number of Burmese asylum seekers has risen rapidly since the latter part of last year, thereby contributing to the high number of recorded registrations.

According to the activist, hundreds of individuals claiming to be members of the Shan ethnic minority in Burma have started approaching the UNHCR in Kuala Lumpur. This is in addition to applicants from the Burmese Rohingya and Chin communities.

"We have been told that the UNHCR has received so many applications that they cannot schedule lots of people for an interview. We were also told they face a shortage of interpreters," he said.

Interim measures

K Shan, the refugee committee co-ordinator at Amnesty International's Malaysia chapter, also expressed concern over the pause in registration in view of the recent security problems in southern Thailand, where many asylum seekers are believe to be sent upon deportation from Malaysia.

Parts of southern Thailand have been placed under martial law after a group of persons, said to be militant separatists, bombed several locations, prompting a large military presence in the border area between Malaysia and Thailand.

Shan said that - since the position of the asylum seekers would be threatened by the presence of security forces of both countries in the border area - they should be allowed to seek protection.

"The UNHCR should consider how the suspension of registration will affect asylum seekers, especially since southern Thailand is no longer a safe place for them to stay," he said when contacted.

"Interim measures should be taken in view of the developments. It is not fair for the other groups if only the Acehnese can continue to register as per normal."

Asylum seekers from troubled areas in the region have been approaching the UNHCR in Kuala Lumpur for years to be recognised as refugees and resettled in a third country.

However, over the past three years, their numbers have multiplied due to intensifying conflicts in their home countries, particularly in neighbouring Indonesia and Burma.

Thousands of Acehnese have fled to Malaysia due to the armed conflict between the Indonesian government and the separatist Free Aceh Movement since last May, while thousands more Burmese nationals have fled alleging ethnic and religious persecution by their government.