The 15 foreigners arrested outside the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) office yesterday have been registered as asylum seekers, said a protection officer from the agency today.

She said UNHCR officials made the registration after meeting and interviewing the 15 at the Brickfields district police headquarters.

The detainees were on their way to meet UNHCR officials but were arrested at a roadblock for not having proper documents.

Released in the evening

The 15 were later released by the police in the evening.

Earlier today, a UNHCR officer, who declined to be named, said 10 of the asylum seekers were from Aceh while the remainder were from Burma and Sri Lanka.

All three states are engulfed in political unrest and form the majority of refugees, asylum-seekers and illegal immigrants in Malaysia.

Following their arrest, Brickfields police chief Zulhasnan Najib said they were merely enforcing the law as the those arrested did not posses valid documents.

Malaysia has not ratified it laws to accommodate the 1951 UN Convention on Refugees, a treaty long recognised by other states as customary international law.