Malaysia: NGO says more foreign domestic workers denied food
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MALAYSIA -
Read the original article in full: More foreign helpers denied food in Malaysia, NGO says | The Standard
A non-governmental organization said there has been an increase in the incidence of foreign domestic workers in Malaysia being punished by depriving food to them.
“It should be a lesson for all other employers. One of the violations that is increasing is deprivation of food... as a form of punishment. This is worrying,'' said Glorene Das, an official with migrant labor rights organization Tenaganita.
She was responding after a court sentenced a Malaysian couple to 24 years in jail for starving their Cambodian maid to death.
Hardware store owners Soh Chew Tong, 44, and his wife Chin Chui Ling, 42, were found guilty of culpable homicide at a high court in the northern state of Penang.
In response to a series of abuse cases, Cambodia stopped sending its citizens as domestic workers to Malaysia in late 2011, while Indonesia for years suspended sending maids.
Malaysia has promised to improve their welfare and protection, including giving them one day off a week. But activists say the hundreds of thousands of women remain vulnerable to sexual abuse, overwork and exploitation.
They say many workers, who live with the families where they work, still do not get a day off and many are not allowed to leave the home.
Malaysian labor laws do not cover domestic workers. Activists say that while some 200,000 women work in Malaysia legally, many more have been smuggled into the country.
Photo: Magalie L'Abbé/FLICKR
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