Malaysia defies China by freeing Uygur Muslim detainees
Group that made daring escape from Thai prison last year have been sent to Turkey despite Beijing’s request they be returned to China
Malaysia has freed from detention 11 ethnic Uygur Muslims who fled to the southeast Asian nation after breaking out of a Thai prison last year, and sent them to Turkey, their lawyer said on Thursday, in disregard of China’s request to hand them over to Beijing.
The move is likely to put extra strain on ties between Beijing and Kuala Lumpur, which have weakened since Mahathir Mohamad was re-elected Malaysia’s prime minister in May and cancelled more than US$20 billion worth of projects awarded to Chinese companies.
Prosecutors in the Muslim-majority country dropped charges against the Uygurs, aged between 24 and 48, on humanitarian grounds and they arrived in Turkey after flying out of Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday, their lawyer, Fahmi Moin, said.
“The charges were withdrawn because the attorney general’s chambers agreed to the [appeal] from our side,” he said.
China’s foreign ministry said it was in the process of verifying the details with Malaysia and hoped it would “attach great importance” to its concerns. In a faxed statement to Reuters, it said it was against illegal immigration in any form.
“These people are all Chinese nationals. We resolutely oppose them being deported to a third country,” it said.