malaysiakini.com - http://www.malaysiakini.com/news/113632

Several human rights groups have urged the government to curb the increasing number of 'death in custody' resulting from lack of proper health care and poor sanitary conditions.

In a joint statement today, 14 human rights groups claimed that the current immigration detention centers are in deplorable state.

According to them, most centers are overcrowded, poorly sanitized, had insufficient food and inadequate access to medical and health services.

In May, two Burmese asylum seekers died from Leptospirosis. Leptospirosis is an infectious disease that is caused by water or food contaminated by animal urine.

Yesterday, according to the NGOs, six more Burmese detainees died, allegedly from same the cause.

Last month, a Togolese detainee was reported to have died in the same detention centre from Influenza A (H1N1).

Conduct inquest on deaths

Among the actions that groups are calling upon the government authorities such as the Immigration Department and the Health Ministry is to conduct an inquest into the recent deaths of the Burmese detainees.

They recommended that the government make public the results of the post-mortem of all the detainees and to take immediate steps to prevent the spread of diseases to the others.

"The Ministry of Health should monitor the detention centres, set up permanent clinics at immigration detention centres and include foreign workers and refugees in health prevention programme," said the statement.

Meanwhile, the group is also pushing for the government to recognize refugee status, asylum seekers and stateless persons.

The group of 14 includes Amnesty International Malaysia (AIM), Bar Council Human Rights Committee, Malaysian Social Research Institute (MSRI) Suara Rakyat Malaysia (Suaram), Tenaganita and Women's Aid Organisation (WAO).