Malaysia detains Myanmar migrants over deaths in capital

KUALA LUMPUR -- Malaysian police have detained dozens of people from Myanmar following four killings in the Malaysian capital in a number of incidents suspected of being linked to sectarian violence in Myanmar. About 60 people have been held for questioning in recent days, according to Amar Singh Ishar Singh, Kuala Lumpur’s deputy police chief. The killing of four Myanmar migrants in a number of separate incidents in Kuala Lumpur this past week has raised concerns that tensions between Myanmar’s Buddhists and Muslim Rohingya minority are spilling over to the neighbouring Southeast Asian country, where hundreds of thousands of Myanmar nationals have come to seek work and refuge. The killings include a man fatally slashed while sleeping in a car wash centre and another attacked by people with sharp objects in a marketplace, according to media reports. Malaysia’s Bernama state news agency said the 20-year-old victim was sleeping at the car wash when he was attacked by 10 people. It quoted police as saying a man and a woman also suffered injuries in the attack. All the victims were Buddhists from Myanmar, said Singh, the city’s deputy police chief. “We have a feedback that this may be Myanmar Buddhists and Muslims having a spillover here in Kuala Lumpur,” he said. “In Myanmar, the Muslims are the victims, over here the Buddhists are the victims.” Singh said the police had set up a special task force to deal with the violence in Kuala Lumpur and had arrested about 60 Myanmar immigrants this week in an attempt to control tensions. Anti-Muslim violence in Buddhist-dominated Myanmar erupted in western Rakhine State last year and has spread into the central heartlands and areas near the old capital, Yangon, this year. Thousands of Rohingya Muslims have fled from the country to escape the violence and worsening living conditions, many of them making their way by boat or overland to Muslim-majority Malaysia. Malaysia’s has allowed them to stay but without giving them legal status, meaning that most struggle to find work or access to hospitals and schools. Agencies