Reports

Malaysia’s Arbitrary Detention of Migrants and Refugees

The 60-page report, “‘We Can’t See the Sun’: Malaysia’s Arbitrary Detention of Migrants and Refugees,” documents Malaysian authorities’ punitive and abusive treatment of migrants and refugees in 20 immigration detention centers across the country. Immigration detainees can spend months or years in overcrowded, unhygienic conditions, subject to harassment and violence by guards, without domestic or international monitoring.

An undocumented migrant holds her daughter while being detained during an immigration raid

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  • September 7, 2011

    Forced Labor and Other Abuses in Drug Detention Centers in Southern Vietnam

    The 121-page report documents the experiences of people confined to 14 detention centers under the authority of the Ho Chi Minh City government. Refusing to work, or violating center rules, results in punishment that in some cases is torture.

  • January 25, 2010

    The Illegal Arrest, Arbitrary Detention and Torture of People Who Use Drugs in Cambodia

    In this 93-page report Human Rights Watch documents detainees being beaten, raped, forced to donate blood, and subjected to painful physical punishments such as "rolling like a barrel" and being chained while standing in the sun.

  • January 7, 2010

    Incarceration, Ill-Treatment and Forced Labor as Drug Rehabilitation in China

    This 37-page report based on research in Yunnan and Guangxi provinces, documents how China's June 2008 Anti-Drug Law compounds the health risks of suspected illicit drug users by allowing government officials and security forces to incarcerate them for up to six years. The incarceration is without trial or judicial oversight.