Residents of this community near where mass graves of trafficked migrants were discovered eight years ago say the border area is much quieter now – and they’re hoping it stays that way.
A decade ago, distressed foreigners on foot used to knock on doors asking for food. And city dwellers arrived by car from hundreds of kilometers away to buy smuggled goods for cheap at outposts just inside Malaysia.
But all that changed in 2015, after Malaysian authorities discovered more than 100 bodies – thought to be Rohingya and Bangladeshis – in two jungle locations in northern Perlis state, near a camp equipped with cages to lock up migrants.
After that, the authorities launched a crackdown on human smuggling and closed a free-flow zone on the border.
People living in Felcra Lubuk Sireh, a settlement within the boundaries of Wang Kelian that is…
